


Turtles All the Way Down

by Therru



Series: Kissing Families [3]
Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types, Hannibal Lecter Tetralogy - Thomas Harris
Genre: Bottom!Hannibal, Canon-Typical Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Abuse, Crime Scenes, F/F, F/M, Hannibal is a big slut, Hannigram - Freeform, Kinbaku, M/M, Murder Family, Murder Husbands, Psychological Breakdowns, Serial Killers, Sexual Abuse, Shibari, Slash, Smut, Team Sassy Science, Top!Will, Will is NOT a shaking stuttering mess all the time, but everything still happens so much, dark!Will, fightfucking, hangings, homorotica
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-10
Updated: 2017-10-15
Packaged: 2018-08-07 19:21:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 51,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7726669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Therru/pseuds/Therru
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Murder Husbands done fucked. Time to deal with it (or, in Will's case, not deal with it). Among the important questions that will be addressed are: Will Abigail forgive Hannibal and Will for their unfatherly dickbaggery? What the fuck is everyone's game? And, perhaps most importantly, will Hannibal EVER get to top Will again?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Laughably Inappropriate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [asprigofzest](https://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/gifts).



> Beta'd by my beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr). Now, when I say "beta'd by", I mean she provides indispensable insight, support, suggestions, critiques, and generally goes above and beyond what would be expected of any editor. That, and she continues to go above and beyond as my friend, partner, and roommate in the Hannibal Trash dumpster. I love this woman.
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
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> 
>  
> 
>  _ **Entr'acte**_  
> 
>  _The Verger-Ingram wedding is not the cause of the heartbreak that will_ _surround it. It is a divot, small enough to avoid national or even state-wide attention, but large enough for misfortune to pool there. For some, it will be a landmark, something to point at through the fog of melancholy masking the answer to the question everyone will ask:_ Why did this happen? _It will stand out as a beacon does, beckoning with the promise of guiding one towards clarity. It will not deliver. Tragedy will cling to it like twisted vines of miserable ivy, obscuring even the barest of hints as to where to go from here._

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will is pathetic with misery about Abigail leaving. Team Sassy Science work their asses off to obviously no avail. We are reminded once more of Jack’s general awfulness. Princess Hannibal tugs a little on Ardelia’s heartstrings.

After the extended post-exam break, Will returns to teaching. Five days is all it took for his world to implode. Subconsciously, he hopes another five will somehow undo this.

He isn’t able to conjure up enough numbness to get him through all the waking hours. For him, there are too many to contend with. Though he manages to at least dull the feeling of being relentlessly kicked in the stomach for the duration of his work day, the forced stoicism systematically dismantles itself on the drive back to Wolf Trap. By the time Liza’s bright  _See you tomorrow!_  reaches his ears, he is sure he will have to crawl to the door on his hands and knees in order not to collapse. He doesn’t, of course, but the dogs quickly become accustomed to watching him crumple in the front hall instead.

At first, the hope persists that, if he acts out his daily routine, pretending nothing has changed, this aberrant turn of events will correct itself. Day after day, he pretends nothing is broken. Day after day, he denies that he is just as – if not  _more_  – culpable than Jack in destroying their family. Day after day he hopes, pretends, denies.

But Abigail doesn’t come home.

 

Hannibal let exactly one week pass before attempting to speak with Will again. Will, out of sheer loneliness, picked up the phone when it rang.

“I haven’t had any federal agents kicking down my door. Can I assume you didn’t point them at me?”

“What do you think?”

“What did you give them?”

“Nothing. I recommended we focus on the victims. Maybe a family member wanting revenge. Garbage. They’re not looking for you.”

“Thank you.”

Will hadn’t known what to say.  _You’re welcome_  seemed laughably inappropriate. After a moment or two of silence, he’d simply hung up.

 

The only way Will can get through the early analysis of the Carpenter’s carcass is by looking at a single skinned body part at a time. He’s had more than enough of the big picture. After a few grueling days, the team conclude that, physically, their John Doe fits the profile, and _his_ death is in keeping with the Ghost’s penchant for pageantry. Having no ID for the Carpenter, however, that’s as far as they get.

“Nothing about a big, unfriendly giant in NaMUS?”

“No, Zee.” Price gives him an exaggerated eye-roll. “The Carpenter isn’t exactly milk-carton material.”

“Great. So, he has no fingerprints – obviously – no friends, and, apparently, no dentist.” Zeller clears his throat before reading aloud from his laptop screen. He adopts a higher pitch and a smarmy tone, with no explanation as to why he does so. “ _Agent Zeller. Unfortunately, we were unable to match the photos we received with any existing dental records. If possible, please provide a mould_.”

“Did you send the good photos?”

“No, Jimmy, I sent the crappy ones.”

Price sighs. He sighs a lot these days. “It was a long-shot anyway.”

“Why’s that?” Will asks, regretting the question seconds after it leaves his mouth.

“There are no obvious signs of dental work – no crowns, fillings, nothing. Wisdom teeth are all either impacted or partially-impacted.”

“Feel for yourself,” Zeller invites, adding meanly, “if that’s what you’re into.”

“I’ll take your word for it, thanks.”

“Plus, we think he was poor,” Price continues, ignoring their fractious exchange.

The heat continues to rise in Wills cheeks, especially when Zeller goads him shamelessly.

“Right, professor? You’re the profiler.” Today, Zeller is snarky even by his own standards.

“Yeah,” Will replies, narrowing his eyes coldly. “We think he was poor.”

Price clucks at them like a disapproving mother hen.

Will folds his arms and looks back down at the corpse, chastened by this, he realizes with delayed amusement. “Okay,” he says. “No money, no dentist.”

Zeller, too, curbs his quarrelsome instincts for the moment. “Hell, I can barely afford a cleaning, even with our benefits,” he mumbles gruffly.

Price decides this is worthy of some friendly teasing. “I’ll bet your mouth is riddled with dental work, Zee.”

“Offense taken.”

“I see how much sugar you eat. When’d you get your first crown?”

Zeller tongues at one of his molars as he does the mental math. “Thirteen,” he confesses. “Same time I got my first cavity.” He shrugs. “Go big or go home.”

The atmosphere in the lab is marginally less tense after this. When Mapp checks in at the end of the day, Price reports (giving them each a fond pat on the back) that Will and Zee were very good, the way a babysitter reports to returning parents that the children had gone to bed on time with no fuss.

Agent Mapp has taken to stopping by the lab before she leaves for the night, to see if anyone is still there. If anyone is, she rousts them from the near-stupor they are usually in and says, “Go  _home_ , people.” Though she never caves to the hopelessness that filters through the department like a poisonous gas when progress on the case slows, her smiles are few and far between.

Today, however, Mapp manages a smile  _and_ a chuckle. “I like to see my boys getting along,” she says, matching Price’s tone. “Now, get out of here, please.”

 

By the following Monday, they still have no tangible leads, though Will knows for a fact that Liza Lake spent her entire weekend in the field. He wishes he could have told her not to bother. He feels doubly guilty when, on Tuesday afternoon, he heads to the lab and she isn’t there.

“We made her take a nap,” Price informs him. “We’re pretty sure she was sleeping standing up earlier.”

“She made us promise to wake her up when you got here, though.” Given Zeller’s cranky tone alone, there is no way to interpret this but as an accusation. Not one for subtlety, however, he lets the day’s used instruments and glassware clang loudly against each other as he loads them into the autoclave, and slams the door for good measure. He apologizes to it immediately, stroking the machine’s flank, and burns his hand.

Watching Zeller’s irascible display, Will thinks that the kind-hearted Liza Lake must have the patience of a saint, to put up with him. “Don’t. Let her sleep. I’ll go do some marking.”

“We’re packing it in here pretty soon. One of us could drive you,” Price offers.

“Not it,” Zeller asserts quickly. In response to Price’s disapproving frown, he adds crabbily, “What? I have no idea what she sees in him.”

“Standing right here,” Will comments, as sullen as Zeller is sour.

“I don’t know what she sees in  _you_.”

“Oh, puh-leeze. Liza only has eyes for you.” Price’s own eyes turn heavenward. “Inexplicably. You should let your green-eyed monster take a nap once in a while, too, Zee.”

Zeller mutters something profane and walks away.

“He’s just grumpy because he didn’t get to see her this weekend,” Price explains, once he’s out of earshot.

Will isn’t sure if that makes him feel worse, or maybe just a little bit better.

 

Wednesday finds Price having a tête-à-tête with the corpse, and Lake and Zeller – according to Price – making out in a closet somewhere.

“Okay, Johnny,” Price addresses the dead body. “You just chill in here for a while.” He slides the drawer in and shuts the cadaver cabinet, chuckling to himself.

Will clears his throat.

Price turns around and gives Will a half-hearted smile. “We were just chatting…” He trails off, waving vaguely at the door he’d just closed. He rubs his forehead. “I am  _so_  tired.”

 

Mapp, Zeller, and Price are working through their lunch break in Mapp’s office one afternoon when an administrative agent knocks on, then pokes his head through the open door.

“Agent Mapp?”

“Yes. How can I help you?”

He approaches the desk and Mapp rises from her seat with her hand extended. They shake, then, with his other hand, he offers her a large manila envelope. “This was just faxed through to our office addressed to Jack Crawford. I guess they haven’t updated their cover sheets...”

“Who are  _they_?” Mapp demands, taking the envelope from him and unwinding the irritating red string that is still somehow a staple measure in interdepartmental security.

“One of the data centres in Florida. We get reports from them all the time, but sometimes they come in specifically for Agent Crawford. So... do you want it?”

Ardelia flips through the contents, mouth already settling into a hard, disapproving line. “Have you looked at this?”

“Briefly.”

“If this wasn’t addressed to Agent Crawford, would you have forwarded it to our department?”

“I wouldn’t have forwarded it to  _any_  department. Not without making some calls first. Sometimes they make us chase down details.” The man gives the file an unimpressed look. “This wouldn’t be worth passing on without more information.”

“What’s up, Boss?” Zeller asks. He balls up a napkin that had contained an entire ham sandwich moments ago, and wipes his mouth.

Mapp frowns unhappily. “You’re right – this is maddeningly sloppy.” She slides the papers back into the envelope and taps her fingertip against the corner, humming contemplatively. “This is completely inappropriate,” she concludes decisively. She holds the envelope back out to him. “If this happens again, please notify me so I can call and lecture someone. Proceed with this as you do with all incoming files.”

“No problem, Agent Mapp. Sorry to disturb you.”

“Don’t be. I’m glad you brought this to my attention.” When the agent departs, Mapp turns back to the other two. “Apologies, gentlemen, but I’ve had just about enough of Agent Crawford’s residual misconduct.” She sounds downright rankled.

“What’s the matter?” Price asks.

“I dislike people bypassing essential components of the system. It’s extremely disrespectful.”

“We don’t get dibs on cases just because Jack had a friend in Florida?” Zeller teases.

“I know you’re joking, Agent Zeller, but no, we absolutely do not.” She gives him a tight smile.

Price asks a little more seriously, “Are you expecting to see that file again?”

Mapp shakes her head. “I can’t imagine why it would be directed to us. Group suicide, not even reported as suspicious. There are about ten other departments that could take lead on that.” Mapp only hyperbolizes when she’s approaching exhaustion, and this time is no exception.

Price nods in agreement. “That sounds far too benign for Behavioural Science.” His tone is light, but the words are delivered on a sigh.

 

Hannibal, reassured by his brief conversation with Will, begins consulting for the BAU again soon after this. He does so during the day, while Will is giving lectures, and is gone by the time Will arrives at the lab to do the same. Mapp divides the Carpenter’s victims into two groups by region, assigning one to Hannibal and the other to Will. On their separate schedules, they investigate the families and friends of their assigned victims, flagging anyone with a history of violence or mental disorders for interview, along with significant others who appeared particularly unhinged during their depositions. Mapp is immediately aware of the changes in Hannibal’s and Will’s demeanours signifying a shift in their relationship – or perhaps its disintegration. However, she neither comments on nor asks about their status.

 

In the last week before the Academy’s final exam period, Will is too busy cramming material into the remaining lecture time to consult. On day three, Price makes the mistake of asking Hannibal how Will is doing.

“Fine, I’m sure,” Hannibal answers tersely. “You’ll have to ask him.”

“Oh?” Price and Zeller ask in unison.

When he answers, Hannibal’s voice is bland and unfeeling, and he does not look up from the spread of results between them on the lab bench. “Will and I are no longer seeing each other.”

Zeller flushes uncomfortably. “Sorry, I guess?”

Hannibal barely tilts his head in acknowledgement.

Mapp does not look up, either, when she chides, “Focus, please, gentlemen.”

However, later that day, as the two of them eat lunch in her office, Ardelia softens. “My kitchen is still open to you, Hannibal.”

“Thank you. That is very kind, Ardelia.”

The following day, he allows for the admission that mealtimes have become lonely without Will and Sarah. Ardelia gives him her warm but customarily guarded smile.

The next day, she invites him over for dinner on the weekend, and Hannibal graciously accepts.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by my beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest) on A03 & [aweesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr).
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	2. Elementary Data-Collection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ardelia is better at Hannigram than Hannibal and Will are (the silly bitches). She and Hannibal have a nice, quiet, sophisticated evening together, and Hannibal is able to let his pretentious douchebaggery run free.

Ardelia Mapp lives in a small, working class neighbourhood at Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, where the Shenandoah River meets the Potomac. The two waterways cradle the floodplains just below the quiet little cul-de-sac where her duplex is nestled. As he crosses the Highway 340 bridge, Hannibal concludes that her decision to surround herself on three sides by water, with eyes on the only way over for miles, is quite apt. The bridge had been quite the investment for Jefferson County when it was built, and is well maintained so that the otherwise inaccessible spit of land welcomes visitors.  _How apropos_. Agent Mapp, aware that she comes across as remote, actively extends ways and means of being reached, carefully cultivating some connection with those she works with and oversees. Hannibal wonders if she has to do the same in her personal life, or if those bridges arise naturally.

 

Mapp answers the door promptly, dressed up but barefoot. Nails painted a dark bronze peek out from under the hem of her printed skirt. Her feet are as elegant as her hands. Hannibal crouches to remove his shoes. She doesn’t make false protestations, or insist that it’s fine to keep them on. The carpeted front room is very clean, though not clinically so. There is something homey about it – it feels lived-in.

Two small sofas and a coffee table are covered in dark maroon and silver Kente-like cloth. The couch cushions are the same in maroon and a yellow. Sweetgrass baskets of various sizes sit on the side tables and bookshelves, and one large one sits on the floor filled with various magazines. From the wall opposite the door, an almost floor-to-ceiling print of Tamara Natalie Madden’s  _Eritrea_ observes them calmly. Clearly, Ardelia draws strength from her heritage.

From his position, he can see that the stairs lead up to a partially visible bathroom and an exposed wedge of what is likely her bedroom. There is space enough for a third room, he deduces, from the dimensions he took while walking up her driveway. Perhaps a study. There is no desk in sight on this level, and he knows she never leaves Quantico empty-handed. He wonders if the closed door on the landing is an office, or if she keeps it as a guest room, doing her after-hours work sitting up in bed instead. He finds both images aesthetically appealing to imagine.

He notes all this quickly, before standing again. Ardelia takes his coat and, there being no closet, drapes it carefully over the banister. “Blessed with taste, I see,” Hannibal commends, indicating the framed portrait. She seems to have decorated the room according to its colour palette.

“Without the means to properly indulge it, I’m afraid.”

“Cursed, then, perhaps.”

“Champagne taste on a beer budget,” Ardelia laughs. “Thank you, anyway. Shall we get to work?”

More hints at her background and private life await him in the kitchen, though they are mere hints. Hannibal spots a door at the other end of the kitchen and infers that the kitchen is a shared space.

“Did you find the place alright?” Ardelia asks.

Hannibal is struck with a sudden rush of disappointment at the banality of the question. That is, until he sees she is twisting her ring around and around her finger, her lips slightly pursed. The disappointment quickly transforms into a thrill of pleasure. She is nervous.  _Much more interesting_. “Just fine,” he responds amiably. “I enjoy driving on the highway at night. It was a pleasant expedition.”

“Good.” Ardelia hands him a rust-coloured apron and, after donning her own, sets about pouring them each a drink.

Hannibal unfolds the apron, and catches the scent of new fabric. Though it has been laundered and pressed, it has never been worn, in contrast to Ardelia’s, which is clearly more broken in. He smiles to himself and ties it about his waist. “May I ask what we are making?”

She holds out a glass of wine to him and takes a sip from her own before answering. “I thought I’d throw you in the deep end. How do you feel about jerk chicken?”

“Curious. I’m told that what you do, you do well, so I am eager to try it.”

“Excellent.”

Her subsequent smile is a little more relaxed than the previous one. Her usual authoritative air returns as well, and she directs him to the cupboard containing mixing bowls and the like. Perhaps the nervousness was simply temporary discomfort at having someone else in her home. He wonders what other traits she has in common with Will, then promptly aborts that line of thought.

When he returns to the counter with a stainless steel bowl, she points to the sink, beside which a bag of green peas sits waiting to be shelled. “Your turn.”

He opts to match the speed at which she had shelled the peas for their _rìsi e bìsi_  dish a few weeks ago. While he is bent to his task, she crushes several cloves of garlic with the blade of a large kitchen knife, grates nutmeg and cinnamon, and pounds them all together with some fresh thyme in a polished stone mortar. She wipes off the end of the pestle with her finger and scrapes it into the bowl with the rest of the mixture. Hannibal looks forward to the scent lingering on her fingertip.

Ardelia lifts a heavy cast-iron skillet from a nail on the wall by the stove. “All done?” she asks, and holds her hand out for the bowl of peas. “There are some peppers in the fridge.”

The peas go in the skillet with a slab of butter, and Ardelia briskly moves on to the next task – peeling and slicing plantains. Hannibal watches her complete the task. It doesn’t take long, but it is long enough for her to feel the heat of his gaze, and for a tinge of pink to appear in her cheeks.

Then, she is dicing tomatoes and saying, “The chicken is in the fridge as well.”

Hannibal makes a show of starting minutely, as if from a trance. “Forgive me. You have very elegant hands. It’s rather mesmerizing to watch you work.” He crosses the kitchen to the refrigerator but, before opening the door, he fingers the sheaf of coupons pinned to it with a magnet. He doesn’t know when he began to find thriftiness endearing. When he met Will, no doubt. “You’re a couponeer.”

“World class,” Ardelia confirms. “How do you think I afford–” She cuts herself off abruptly. After a moment’s pause, she gives a microscopic shake of her head and continues chopping, albeit with slightly more force.

Hannibal doesn’t pry. He busies himself instead with recovering the paper bag of Scotch bonnet peppers from the crisper.

Ardelia produces a second cutting board from the cupboard beneath her, and another knife from the drawer above that. After rinsing the peppers, Hannibal goes to slice one in half and is stopped by Ardelia’s hand, which suddenly lashes out to grab hold of his arm.

“Don’t!” she cries out, alarmed. “You have to hold it by the stem!”

“Thank you. It seems cooking is more perilous in the southern United States than it is in Europe.”

“You don’t mess with chili peppers.”

When the perilous peppers have been carefully seeded and chopped, they are added to a small food processor and blended with the other ingredients. “Please give me a job with which I may redeem myself.”

“How are your butchery skills?” Ardelia takes the chopping board and rinses it off for him.

Hannibal tries not to smile. He retrieves a whole chicken carcass from the refrigerator and returns to her side. She places the meat cleaver on the countertop between them. If she is setting him up, she is much subtler than Jack had been, with his clumsy fish metaphors.

“How’s that?” he asks after the first few chops, when she puts a shallow glass casserole dish before him.

“Smaller. They won’t take the seasoning like that.” After a few moments, she explicates. “My grandma taught me to cook, and marinating wasn’t standard practice since she grew up without a refrigerator.”

“Ah. Clever solution.”

“Less time to prepare, too. Which is nice when you’re only cooking for one.”

“I enjoy the preparation, even if I am eating alone. I find it therapeutic.”

Ardelia laughs lightly. “You have more patience than I do.”

He splits several of the larger pieces into chunks. “Something that comes with age, I’m afraid.” He feigns a world-weary tone, greatly amusing himself.

“I don’t know about that,” Ardelia counters, still smiling. “My grandma didn’t have much.” The reminiscence brings a softness to her voice, which disappears when she appraises his work. “What are you doing throwing that neck out?”

Hannibal raises his eyebrows at her.

She points to his pile of discards and playfully chides, “Put that handsome thing back in there.”

 

A short while later, they find themselves seated at the table with their wine, while the heavily seasoned chicken grills in the oven, enjoying the coziness of a warm kitchen filled with the scent of good, hearty food cooking away.

“It’s never been my inclination to dig for gossip,” Ardelia begins, cautiously. “I  _would_  like to ask how you are, though.”

“Truthfully?” Hannibal tops up his glass and looks at her meaningfully, as though warning her that she is about to open Pandora’s Box.

“Of course,” she replies, almost sternly. “But only in as much or as little detail as you’re comfortable with.” She nudges her glass towards him.

Hannibal cocks his head to the side as he refills it for her. “Some psychiatrists use that as a tactic to loosen the tongue.”

Ardelia raises an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

“Patients share, then, out of gratitude, or else the fear that they are not interesting enough.” He smiles, as though they are sharing a joke.

Ardelia’s lips curve up, but that is where her smile ends.

Seeing this, Hannibal hastens to say, taking care to sound appropriately contrite, “That was not an accusation. Forgive me.”

Ardelia shakes her head. “It’s alright. I have a tendency to preface unnecessarily. It could easily be taken for manipulation,” she admits. “Not my intention.”

He lowers his eyes to his wine glass and rubs his thumb up and down the stem slowly. At length, he answers her original query, and finds it doesn’t take much to sound sincere. “Sad.”

She nods. Clearly, she hadn’t expected any other sort of answer. Her voice is soft when she acknowledges, “I’d be sad, too.”

“It’s difficult to face the end of a relationship without holding onto the hope that it isn’t  _truly_  the end.”

“Do you believe this is the end?”

There is a strange, strained quality in her voice that causes Hannibal to look up from his wine and study her face. Their eyes meet, and hers are searching his face as well. He thinks of what Will had told him – that she’d hoped Will seeing a different therapist would take some weight off their relationship. He thinks of how she’d arranged rides for him, so Hannibal wouldn’t have to drive three hours a day if he wanted Will home with him. At the time, both gestures had irked him. Now he is simply curious about her apparent commitment to preserving what had been between himself and Will, and about what, exactly, she thinks that was.

“I’m still hoping it’s not... But I believe there is nothing I can do or say to make him change his mind.”

“Why?” Ardelia sounds mournful to him, though nothing in her voice has audibly changed.

“He believes our relationship to be toxic for Sarah. How does one argue against the wellbeing of a child?”

“One doesn’t. But is he right?”

Hannibal slowly shakes his head in a display of melancholy acceptance. “At a certain point, believing something is toxic makes it so.”

Ardelia furrows her brow at the painful truth in his statement. “Well, I hope...” She sighs. “I don’t know what I hope.” Her hands are folded on the table between them and she begins twisting the ring on her finger again. “Saying  _I hope you all find happiness_  sounds like an empty platitude in my head…”

“There’s no need for exactitude. I believe I gathered the sentiment.” He then reaches out to place a hand on hers, just for a moment or two.

 

The peas, tomatoes, and plantains get simmered in the heavy black skillet when the chicken is nearly done. Hannibal is tasked with moving them around the pan to prevent them sticking, while Ardelia dices papaya. “To cut the spice,” she elucidates. Then, rather abruptly, she says, “I’m glad you accepted my invitation tonight.”

He places a hand gently on her shoulder. She doesn’t stop dicing, so the joint bobs up and down beneath his palm. She turns to face him and squeezes his arm with the hand not covered in papaya juice, then slips by him to turn the oven off. Hannibal goes back to stirring.

“At our last dinner, you made it clear that I should feel I can talk to you,” Ardelia begins, then hesitates.

Hannibal leaves his face intentionally neutral. “Is there something you’d like to discuss?”

She shakes her head and continues, “I’d just like you to feel the same way. The past few months can’t have been easy on you.”

Hannibal ponders this as they plate their dinners.

Ardelia gives him an out. “Then again, my background is in law, not psychology, so if you’d rather I didn’t ask…”

“I like that you ask.” Hannibal cuts her off without  _actually_  cutting her off. “I’m honoured to have someone like you concerned about my wellbeing.”

“Good.”

“There isn’t much I would feel uncomfortable sharing with you,” Hannibal tells her, as they return to the table and sit. “I believe you already know me better than most.” He steeples his fingers over his plate. Ardelia clasps hers under her chin. They look like they are saying grace, but they give the topic of God a wide berth, honing in on their own humanity instead.

With the rather awkward offer of a sympathetic ear out of the way, the last remnants of Ardelia’s former nervousness disappear entirely. Her next observation is keen, and she states it matter-of-factly. “You have this air of transparency, but there’s plenty you don’t share.”

Hannibal wonders if wine makes her bold. He makes a mental note to pay closer attention to their progression through the bottle next time. It’s the sort of elementary data-collection he would have done during their first dinner together, had he not been so preoccupied with Will. If they had met even a year ago, all things observable about Special Agent Ardelia Mapp would have been collated, catalogued, and filed within the first week of their acquaintance. The details would be readily accessible, kept in one of the recesses near the front entrance of his memory palace. Had they met back then, the game would be well underway by now. “There is much of you that is opaque,” Hannibal returns, angling his wrists slightly so that he is pointing at her with his steepled fingers.

Neither of them has yet taken a bite of their dinner. Now, Ardelia sighs as she picks up her fork. “Yes, I’ve been told that,” she concedes.

“But  _you_  do not put on airs.”

She smiles at that. “I didn’t say you put on airs.”

Hannibal’s eyes twinkle at her. “Oh, but I do.” He picks up a napkin and, holding it by a corner, lets it fall out of its folds. Then, with a demonstrative flourish, he lays it across his lap. Her smile widens, and his grows to match it. “This table is a little spare. Perhaps I should have brought flowers.”

“No, you certainly should not have,” Ardelia laughs.

Though he’s actively avoiding thoughts of them, the similarities between her and Will are being uncovered with all the order of a freshly shuffled deck of cards. Same, black. Different, red. Heart, diamond, spade, diamond, club, club, heart. No order in their revelations but the certainty that they would count up even in the end.

“It could use some ornament, don’t you think? I could use one of your baskets to make an arrangement from your garden.”

Ardelia is about to take a bite, but is startled into laughter once again before the fork reaches her mouth. “The food will get cold.”

Hannibal finally takes a bite. “This is delicious. Perhaps addressing your absence of flora can be left ’til next time.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by my beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr). My friend, partner, and roommate in the Hannibal Trash dumpster.
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	3. Right with the Riz

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Since _fucking Hannigram_ aren’t doing it, Margot and Judy fight to prove that love prevails. Also, Mason teams up with Bedelia du Maurier – who, by the way, is batshit insane. Like in the show, only eviler.

“Marguerite Elizabeth Verger–”

“It’s just Margo. M-A-R-G-O. Papa had a thing about five-letter names beginning with  _M_.”

“You spell it with a  _t_ on the end.”

“Small victories.”

Margot and Judy are in Chicago, getting the legal formalities of matrimony out of the way before returning to Muskrat Farm for the ceremony and reception. It is not in the least bit romantic.

They sign the documents with their lawyer and the officiant, Judy going over each form several times despite Margot’s apparent boredom. It takes the entire morning. When the other two excuse themselves for a smoke break, Judy apologizes.

“We _have_ to make sure there are no loopholes.”

“I understand. I know I’m not helping.” Margot lays her head on Judy’s shoulder, and Judy nuzzles her hair. Lately, Margot’s mood swings have covered not only the extremes of the spectrum, but every intermediate value as well. Today, she is listless and abstracted. “I want to go home.”

Judy strokes Margot’s cheek and murmurs, “I want to make love to my wife.”

Margot finally smiles at that. “That sounds nice, too.”

 

The gym at Muskrat Farm is high-tech black and chrome, with the complete Nautilus cycle of machines, free weights, aerobic equipment, and even a juice bar. While Margot and Judy are away in Chicago, Barney enjoys having the space all to himself, and works out as much as possible. He finds out quickly enough, however, that Margot not being there doesn’t stop him thinking about her.

In the course of his professional life, Barney has understandably come to find the human body grotesque. Margot Verger, though, is the quintessence of womanly beauty. _Her_ body is perfect, and she knows it. He’s begun to suspect that Margot is messing with him on purpose, for her own amusement, and wonders if she hasn’t subconsciously picked up a thing or two from her evil twin over the years.

It took him a while to notice, because, in the gym at least, they are equals. When he makes himself a smoothie at the juice bar, he always makes one for her as well, and she does the same. They are on a first name basis in this part of the house. Sometimes they talk, sometimes they don’t. She’s alright to talk to. She asks him questions about his time in the Marine Corps, and doesn’t seem much interested in his experience as an orderly. Where Abigail was broadly curious, Margot mines for specific anecdotes.

He often has the feeling that she is constructing him out of puzzle pieces she’s fashioned herself from the stories he tells her. He’s curious what the final picture will look like. He knows her education was an open plain, defined by logic, but she is selective with her reasoning, and, like any Verger, believes what she wants to believe, right to the core of herself.

His suspicion first arose when he noticed that, no matter how he goes about stalling, he always ends up in the shower first. And, once she joins him, Margot always chooses the shower stall right next to him. Once, after a particularly heavy workout, already wondering what the sweat at the nape of her neck would taste like, he found her staring at him through the single pane of glass separating them. Or, rather, staring at his massive erection. She hadn’t say anything, however, and went back to washing her intimate areas, unembarrassed. He didn’t know where to look, so he looked at her feet.

He is always first in, and, as a result, first out, so, every time, he has to endure the sight of her emerging from the shower in all her naked glory, and, to make it worse, walking the good ten paces to where she hangs her towel.

It’s strategic. It has to be. And yet, she somehow seems innocent to it. She doesn’t watch for his reactions, but she doesn’t pretend shower time is just a way to extend their conversations. They shower in silence, sluicing their own respective bodies instead of each other’s, despite the fact that at least one party always desperately wants to reach through the glass. Ever since the erection incident, if it can be called an incident, their workout sessions have been occuring more and more out of sync.

 

When she and Judy return from Chicago, legally married but feeling no different for it, Margot works out daily, and, one afternoon, chance aligns her workout with Barney’s once again.

They exercise in silence, but both gravitate to the juice bar once they’ve finished, towelling sweat off their respective brows. Margot perches on the counter next to a bowl of fruit and nuts, peeling a banana while Barney cracks two eggs on the rim of the blender and drops them in. She hands him the banana one half at a time, but that is where her help ends. She absently plays with a clementine, spinning it on the stainless steel countertop. Once she tires of that she moves on to rotating walnuts in her palm like a pair of Baoding balls. When Barney looks up, she is studying his  _Semper Fi_  tattoo.

“Can you?” she queries, offering him the walnuts.

“I don’t know.” Barney’s big fist clenches momentarily, and then the nuts lie halved in his open palm. He picks off the loose bits of shell and holds his hand out, offering them back to her.

While he pours their smoothies, Margot plucks another walnut from the bowl and considers it. “Can you do just one?”

Barney hesitates, torn between an impulse to impress her, and suspicion regarding her motives for asking. Her face only displays wide-eyed curiosity, but looks are layered, and sometimes the top layer lies. Still, he takes the walnut. His face flushes and his neck is corded with strain for about three seconds, then there is a loud crack followed by the sound of shell hitting the counter, and he reveals the bare walnut clamped between his thumb and the blade of his forefinger.

Margot looks genuinely pleased for a moment. “That’s impressive,” she applauds him, and Barney flushes for a different reason. They drink their smoothies in silence. She continues to study him openly, the curiosity in her eyes now sharpened to a point. When the warmth in his stomach settles, he senses that the exchange he’d been expecting for months is approaching, and his instincts are right.

“What are you up to, Barney?” Margot doesn’t even bother to phrase it as anything other than an accusation.

“Margot…” Barney starts with a sigh. “I’m never  _up to_  anything.”

“You do know something, though.”

“I really don’t.”

“Why is Cordell back?”

“I don’t know, Margot. All I know is, he’s back, and as much of a bastard as ever.”

“You could kill him,” she suggests.

“I’d rather not. He’s Mason’s pet.”

“You could kill Mason.”

“And so it begins,” Barney mutters to himself.

“Well, why don’t you?”

“I don’t know what sorta things he has in place for people who betray him, and I don’t plan on finding out.”

“Are you scared of him, Barney?” She sniffs haughtily, looking away when he doesn’t answer. “If you’re scared of him, you’d better be scared  _enough_.”

After that, they barely talk, and, after a few days, their paths rarely cross at all. Margot isn’t sure which of them started adjusting their schedule to avoid the other. Maybe they both had.

 

Judy has been tiptoeing around Margot’s feelings ever since that dinner at Ella’s. Their two-day trip to Chicago and their single lovemaking session are barely a blip on the radar. She thinks longer before talking, and goes back to choosing her words so carefully, it’s painful. Margot feels it, and resents it, but the alternative is being flooded with sadness at any given moment. She’d rather be annoyed, and, after a while, it seems Judy would rather let her be. Either that, or she’s too annoyed herself to hide it anymore.

“Not now, Margot.” Judy sighs when Margot perches coquettishly on her desk, looking for idle conversation. “Look at all the crap I have to get through today.”

“The caterers will be here soon. Come and try some cake with me.”

“Goddamit, not  _now_ , Em,” Judy snaps, then immediately buries her head in her arms. “I’m sorry, baby. I just have so much work to do...”

This is one of those rare occasions in which Judy is close to tears. Margot hears it in her voice and, for a split second, hates Abigail for it. She bites her lip and frowns at what looks like an entire library built around Judy’s work space. “You should hire a new assistant.”

“I don’t even know if my old assistant quit.” Judy slowly lifts her head and sits back in her chair, massaging her temple. “I guess I have grounds to fire her. I don’t want to though, so she’d better have a damn good explanation when she gets back.” She is suddenly struck with a thought, and looks up at Margot, worry written all over her face. “You don’t think they hurt her, do you?”

“Will wouldn’t,” Margot counters quickly.

Judy looks away.

“What?”

“See, that right there... No wonder Abigail didn’t tell us anything. She knows how upset you’d be having to lie to Will again.”

“Jude...”

“Don’t. I don’t want to start sounding like a jealous girlfriend because it’s nothing like that.”

Far from fragile today, Margot retreats into a lofty chill. “Good,” she declares coldly, and stalks out of the room. A little while later, she actually seeks out Mason in the hopes of a more satisfying fight.

 

Bedelia du Maurier sits at the foot of Mason’s bed, propped up on one hand. Her posture is too familiar – a sort of casual poise, one shoulder slightly angled forward and a thick ringlet of honey-coloured hair draped over the other. It’s not idle flirtation when she crosses one leg over the other and drums her glossy nails on the bedspread. She is keenly aware of how she looks at all times, and poses, as she always does, as though a photographer is in the room with them. She doesn’t smile. Doesn’t do more than lift the corner of her mouth – she doesn’t share Judy’s philosophy on laugh lines.

“Tell me, Mr. Verger. What makes you think we’d be a good fit?”

“You’re just as twisted as he is.”

“As who is?”

“Why, Dr. Lecter, of course.”

Bedelia makes a show of calling something to mind. “I had another patient tell me that. He is... no longer with us.”

“My, my.”

“He was obsessed with Hannibal Lecter. What are _you_ obsessed with, Mason Verger?”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, now, Dr. du Maurier. I’ve made right with the Riz. Have you? Do you have _faith_?”

“I don’t need religion to understand Old Testament revenge. I understand that, in this moment, that is what we are talking about.”

Mason Verger’s eyes crinkle at the corners over the porcelain mask. “I think we’ll come to understand each other very well, indeed. Welcome to Muskrat Farm, Doctor.”

Soon after this, Margot arrives, and Bedelia takes her leave. She has been given a suite of rooms on the top floor of the mansion and plans to bask in them for the rest of the afternoon, drinking expensive wine and pretending she’s in Italy.

 

“Are you angry at me for leaving? It feels like, when I got home, you left.”

“Why would I be angry at you?” Margot asks, as though the idea, itself, is absurd.

“Don’t be a bitch, Margot. I know something happened while I was gone. And I’ll bet anything it happened at Dr. Lecter’s dinner. Why won’t you just tell me what it is?”

“Because it isn’t anything!”

“Everything is something. Just because _you_ don’t think it should be important enough to matter, doesn’t mean it isn’t.”

Margot colours and looks away, biting the inside of her cheek to keep her lips from trembling.

Judy adopts a softer tone. “Em… When I asked you at the airport how you were, the first thing you did was start talking about the fucking board meeting.” She reaches out and strokes a hand down Margot’s arm. “As though I’d give a shit after I haven’t seen you in over a week.”

Margot snatches her arm out of Judy’s hand. “Because you’ve got better things to do than try and fix problems I  _don’t have_.”

It’s Judy’s turn to be silent. At length, Margot turns her face back to try and read her expression. She looks like she’s trying to keep her mouth shut.

“ _What?_ ”

Judy shakes her head. “I don’t know. I’m feeling a lot of things right now. Way too many thoughts kicking around.”

“One in particular, I bet.” Margot sets her shoulders back and straightens to her full height. It’s too much, despite her sudden combativeness. She drums her nails on the counter to prevent any other nervous tics from emerging.

Judy bristles visibly at her tone.

“Are  _you_  angry with  _me?_ ”

Judy opens her mouth. Closes it. Pulls her hair out of its ponytail and massages her scalp with her fingers. After a deep breath, she informs Margot, “I’m going for a walk.”

She gets as far as the door before Margot calls after her. “So, I  _have_  to tell you what I’m thinking, but you don’t have to tell me what  _you’re_  thinking?!”

Judy marches back to her with tears in her eyes, her calm scattered. “You fucked him the last time I was away. You were miserable about us afterward, and you’re miserable now. So I’m  _thinking_ , did you fuck him this time too?”

Margot can see that Judy knows she’s not being fair, and that she’d wanted time alone to work through the ugly thoughts. She feels terrible for making Judy say it. “No,” she replies, coolly, forcing herself to barrel past the regret.

“I understand if you got attached. What I  _don’t_  understand is why you feel guilty about it.” Judy wipes at her eyes, getting angrier with each word. “And you’re mad at  _me_  because of it?”

“I’m not attracted to Will, or anyone else with a dick.”

Judy looks away and evens out her breathing before continuing. “You don’t have to be attracted to someone to enjoy being close to them. He was there for you when I wasn’t.”

“What the  _fuck_ , Jude?”

“I’m not suggesting people can’t have sex without forming an emotional attachment. I’m suggesting that  _you_  never have.”

Margot’s lip trembles. “Why are you being like this?”

“Because you  _asked_ , Margot! So I’m telling you, exactly. I feel like I understand how Dr. Goddam Lecter felt, and I hate it!” Her breath is coming rapidly now, and her words erupt from her mouth as though if they fall, the tears won’t. “You gave Will something he couldn’t. And Will gave you something I couldn’t. I don’t know how to deal with that.”

“It still would have been our baby.”

“His too.”

“You don’t know that he’d want anything to do with it. He was so angry at me.”

“He wanted it. I know it. You know it. He knows it.”

“Well...” Margot wants this fight to be over. _Now_. “It doesn’t really matter anymore, does it?”

Judy is clearly ashamed, and a single tear of frustration rolls down her cheek. “I know I shouldn’t be jealous.” She swallows, looking like she wants to say more. To explain further, now that they’re raising the dead. She doesn’t. “I’m sorry.”

“You’ve never been jealous before.”

“I’ve never been scared before.”

“Why are you scared?”

“I can’t stand the thought that I let you down somehow and you don’t trust me anymore…”

Margot takes a little too long to come up with a reply.

 

At 11pm, Judy is still in her office, a thin ribbon of light snaking along the space below the door. Margot goes to bed, but, when it reaches midnight and Judy still hasn’t joined her, she decides another confrontation is in order. She expects an angry Judy asleep at her desk or on the sofa. Instead, she finds her, bleary-eyed to be sure, but awake and still typing, pausing now and then to consult one of the many papers and open books that litter (somehow tidily) most of the available desk space.

Margot melts, instantly remorseful for believing that Judy would ever be so petty. She is in Judy’s lap barely a second after she looks up at Margot with a tired smile and holds her arms out for her. The sheer strength of their embrace imparts how sorry they both are about this afternoon. For a long time, they stay like that, simply holding one another.

When Margot feels it’s safe to talk without bursting into tears, she mumbles, “Why don’t you let me do some of this stuff?” into Judy’s neck.

“Come on, Em. You’re a numbers girl,” Judy reasons gently, stroking her hair.

Margot just leans her head on Judy’s shoulder. “Is it bed time yet?” she asks at length. 

“I don’t know...” Judy appraises the desk situation despairingly. “There’s just so much I have to get done this week.” She yawns painfully wide.

Margot leans over to take Judy’s face in her hands. She tucks the wisps that have come loose from Judy’s ponytail back behind her ears, and gives her a soft kiss. “I’ll be right back.”

She returns ten minutes later with a mug of coffee so large it’s essentially a bowl. She puts it on the desk, close enough to Judy’s hand that Judy will automatically reach for it.

“Thanks, baby.”

“Mhm.” Margot wraps her arms around Judy’s waist, looking over her shoulder at what she’s working on. She gives her a few light kisses on the neck.

“Okay,” Judy sighs after a minute.

“Okay, what?”

“Okay, you can help.”

“I knew it. You were just being stubborn.”

“Well…”

“What do you want me to do?”

Judy hums and surveys the desk. She picks up a rather large file and hands it to Margot apologetically. “Since you were actually  _at_  the board meeting…”

Margot takes it and bends over to kiss Judy soundly on the mouth. “I love you,” she whispers, before taking her project to the low sofa along the back wall and settling to her task.

Judy watches her, loving the way her hair falls as she sits there reading. After a moment or two, she takes a sip from the massive caffeine store she now has, and continues typing.

The next morning finds them both fast asleep on the sofa, somehow, wrapped around one another like they used to be every night.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by my beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr). She has redefined the term "beta-ing" to include providing indispensable insight, support, suggestions, critiques, and generally going above and beyond what would be expected of any editor. She is also my friend, partner, and roommate in the Hannibal Trash dumpster. I love this woman.
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	4. Too Old for this Shit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to a new string (*laughs forever at her own pun*) of murders, because Team Sassy Science can’t catch a break. Will continues to be the master of denial, but also tries to be sociable, which is kinda cute. Ardelia Mapp is hard as fuck.

On any given night in the seemingly interminable series of solitary ones that bob along in the wake of Abigail’s departure, Will lies in bed and can’t get comfortable. Can’t get  _relief_ , let alone comfort. One night, indistinguishable from all the others, he is curled in on himself, perspiring from the pain, and very quickly freezing in the cold room without the ability to even wrap a blanket around himself. When his teeth begin to chatter, he gives up on trying to fight through it. He fetches a bottle of whiskey and brings it back to bed with him, taking several long pulls along the way.

At the bedside, he downs some more, until he is numb enough to at least roll himself up in the quilt. He tells himself it isn’t real, but still shivers in only partially-dulled agony until he finally falls asleep. After waking twice, the bottle remains uncapped for quicker access, and this soon becomes routine. Every night thereafter, he wakes to salty tears streaking his pillow, more pain – ever worse – and the hateful knowledge that the only one who can make it better is the man who had done this to him in the first place.

 

A week or so before the wedding, Zeller and Price track down, corner, and interrogate Will.

“So, the Verger wedding. How’d you get invited to that?”

Will figures he can easily blame it on Hannibal’s social connections, though, if anything, Hannibal would have been  _his_  plus-one. “By association, I guess.”

“Thought you and Dr. Lecter split?”

“Yup.” He shrugs. “Guess they forgot to uninvite me.”

“Lucky bastard…”

“I’m afraid I have to agree with sourpuss here, Will.” Price’s voice is wistful. “It’s supposed to be the event of the year. All sorts of decadent.”

“And I’m sure Will here is going to take full advantage of the opportunity to rub shoulders with Baltimore high society,” Zeller grumbles.

Will scoffs. “I promise to offend someone very important,” he assures them.

Zeller takes on a benevolent tone. “If you’re feeling particularly socially inept that day, I’d just like to offer…”

“The invitation didn’t come with a ticket.”

“Worth a shot.” Price pats Zeller’s shoulder in a conciliatory manner.

Zeller is downright pouty. “Why are all the fun things wasted on people who don’t like having fun?”

Will just shrugs again and walks away. His skin feels pinched and sore.

 

Later that day, when they are gathered in the lab, Agent Mapp announces, “It’s official, ladies and gentlemen. The Ghost and the Carpenter are cold cases.”

Lake, Price, and Zeller all wear the same expression – that of a stiff sort of anger, masked only by their professionalism and, in the case of Zeller and Price, years of experience with similar disappointments.  _Sometimes, you just don’t catch the guy._  Will mimics the expected comportment, though his skin feels taut – pulled tight over the muscles and bones trying to escape.

Mapp’s face is no different from theirs for having made the decision. “We have a new potential serial killer on our hands, whom I will brief the department on tomorrow at 9am. I’ll need your individual reports on the Carpenter by end of day tomorrow.”

The frustrated silence that follows this news is eventually broken by Lake, who responds, “Yes, ma’am,” in her timid way, and starts collecting her things. At the GC, she hums a small, unhappy sigh, and prints out the latest – and last – results.

Zeller and Price slowly follow suit, Zeller assessing how much room they have in the cryofreezer, and Price assembling boxes for the samples they’ll keep in the hope that, one day, the case might be reopened.

“Thank you, everyone.” Mapp turns to leave. Her disappointment is palpable, though her tone and posture give nothing away.

Price says reassuringly, “It’s okay, Boss.” When she turns back, he adds, with both sincere intent to comfort, and clear resignation, “We all knew it was coming. You had to make the call.”

“Thank you, Agent Price.” Mapp gives him her customary appreciative smile before going to inform the other agents of the dawn of a new investigation.

Will’s inclination is to follow her, but then he hears Price swear under his breath, and Zeller right out loud, so he offers lamely, “Can I help?”

Lake exits the lab, sniffling, arms full of papers and photos. Through the glass, Will sees her deposit them on her desk and avail herself of a few Kimwipes from the nearest box. When she buries her face in them, he turns his head away, as though her privacy is somehow his responsibility, and finds that Zeller is gazing at her as well.

“You can take over from Zee,” Price suggests.

Zeller straightens up and hands Will his clipboard. “Yeah,” he says, absently, his eyes locked on Lake. “Thanks, man.” He claps him on the shoulder and makes a beeline for her.

“She’s still young. It hits her harder. It’ll be a while ’til she’s a jaded old son of a bitch like the rest of us.”

Will can only nod. He replaces Zeller, crouching by the lower freezer door, and Price passes him a box of samples. Will labels it carefully and makes note of it on Zeller’s clipboard, and they repeat this a few times before Price speaks again.

“I’m surprised _Zee_ isn’t the one crying.”

“Why do you say that?”

“He was going to propose to her after we caught the bastards.” Price, himself, sounds massively disappointed.

With his usual flair for saying nothing reactive, Will just dons a pair of thermal gloves and says, “Oh.”

Price folds his arms, unimpressed with Will’s gossiping abilities.

“That’s…” Will struggles for literally any adjective, and comes up with, “Nice?”

Price lets out a heavy sigh.

“Sorry,” Will laments. “I’m not good at this.”

“It’s cute that you tried.” Price rolls his eyes and hands Will another box of samples. Turning once more to the bench, he  _tsk_ s and mutters, “ _That’s nice_ …”

Will manages a self-deprecating chuckle and pulls out a drawer.

“Load back to front, please,” Price instructs, with the world-weary tone of having said this many times before.

Will is somewhat taken aback. “Okay…”

Belatedly remembering that Will has done this before, Price explains, sheepishly, “Can’t tell you how many grad students I’ve fired.”

Will gives a sympathetic grunt.

“We don’t get grad students anymore.”

The last stack of sample boxes doesn’t appear to have any corresponding labels. Balancing the clipboard on his knee, he pulls off the left glove to make flipping through the pages easier, but, after a moment or two, he gets frustrated and takes the right glove off too.  _Nothing._  He moves to stand, intending to check the printer, and absently pushes the drawer shut. He jerks his hand away with startled expletive.

This attracts Price’s attention. “Gloves, you ass!” he scolds. Then, suddenly, he leaps the distance between them and yanks Will’s arm back so forcefully, Will topples over backwards, smacking his head on the floor.

“The hell…?” He goes to rub the back of his head and sees his left palm is bright red, shiny, and already swelling where he’d rested it against the inside of the door.

With a surprisingly powerful grip, Price drags him stumbling to the sink and turns on the taps, quickly testing the temperature with his own hand before bringing Will’s under the flow.

Suddenly, it hurts. A  _lot._

“What is  _with_ you, Will?”

“I honestly don’t know…”

Once he’s sure Will is going to thaw out alright, Price softens. “You should see a doctor about this. And take it easy, will you?” He grumbles, albeit good-naturedly, “I’m too damn old to babysit, and too damn busy to be filling out incident reports.”

“Sorry.” Will shakes his head. “Christ, I’m an idiot.”

“Even idiots wear gloves. I’m just saying.”

“I should probably just stay out of your way.”

Price sighs out an agreement and attends to the burn, while Will watches Lake and Zeller on the other side of the glass wall. Zeller is peppering her forehead with kisses, and Lake is laughing, despite her cheeks being wet with tears.

“They seem good together,” Will ventures.

Price perks up at the attempted small-talk. “They are. I think they challenge each other.”

“How’s that?”

“He challenges her to be more assertive, and she challenges him to be–”

“Nicer?” Will offers, with a flicker of humour.

Price chuckles. “ _I’m sure that’s the aspiration_. Baby steps.”

Cleared for duty by Price, Will heads back to the Academy to invigilate exams and mark those already written. He finds that he is able to work for the rest of the day easily and pain-free, apart from the stinging blister on his left hand.

 

The next morning, Will makes coffee for Liza Lake, and, when they get to Quantico, walks her to the locker room and then to the conference room for the briefing. He feels a strange sort of guardianship of her, and only feels comfortable leaving her side once Zeller slings his arm around her. He guides her to their seats, giving Will the finger behind her back.

Hannibal and Will, acutely aware that almost everyone is watching, give one other courteous nods and a wide berth. Hannibal goes to sit near the front. Will, once again, hangs back, annoyed that his complete failure of a personal life has garnered department-wide interest. He opts to lean against the back wall, though the contact quickly becomes painful. He resolves to practice simply being in the same room as Hannibal without his very skin catching fire, his lungs bursting, or his heart beating its way right out of his chest. He thinks he’s managing not to look any more fucked up than he usually does.

The meeting begins.

“First of all, I’d like to thank each and every one of you for your exceptional work on the Carpenter case. I know you’re all disappointed, but I’m confident we’ve done everything we can at present to identify him and his killer.” Ready to move on to her presentation, Agent Mapp turns on the projector, but one of the new graduates – the one who had posited the copy-cat theory – raises his hand before she can begin. She nods to him.

“You’re not going to get in trouble, are you?”

Mapp’s intense focus on the new case wavers, and her fatigue shows through momentarily. “That’s my problem, Agent Aynesworth. I appreciate the concern, but please don’t trouble yourselves over this.” She straightens minutely and tilts her chin upwards a near imperceptible amount, declaring, “If Justice wants to send someone down here to audit, our work will speak for itself.”

A couple of the younger agents begin to clap, but Mapp holds her hand up to quiet them. “Now…”

There are only a few photos of each supposed victim – three muscled men in their late forties found bound with rope, dangling naked from their respective ceilings in circus-type acrobatic positions. There are close-ups of their cyanotic faces and bloodshot eyes, and wide shots of the setups before and after the bodies were removed.

“There were no open wounds, and, according to preliminary assessments, no blunt force trauma. Coupled with the fact that they occurred in separate cities three days apart, these deaths were assumed to be unrelated, and most likely accidental.” She clicks to a slide of the second victim as he was found – suspended face-down by a hip harness with his ankles tied to the tops of his thighs, the effect being that he looks like he’s kowtowing in midair. “Acquaintances of this man, identifying themselves as members of the same rope group as the victim, claimed he was an experienced rigger who never risked self-suspending alone. The media latched onto that, as is their way, and ran off a story about a kinky bondage suicide, despite that being the first thing ruled out by the medical examiner.”

Zeller mutters, “Freddie Lounds’ll be green with jealousy.”

“Indeed. The story caught the attention of the first victim’s friends, who reported that he was similarly experienced, and that those particular leg bindings would have been difficult to tie on one’s own, especially considering the inverted position in which he was found.”

Mapp puts up side-by-side photos of the two men when they were alive. Both men have slightly graying hair and tanned, weathered skin, and are less lean about the middle than their muscular limbs would suggest. One, in an obviously costly suit, has his arm around the shoulders of a young man wearing a graduation cap and gown. It’s one of those photos parents feel they must have, preferably in a rose-garden with the words  _cum laude_ on the diploma. Both the father and son wear forced smiles. The other grins triumphantly at the finish line of the 2014 Disney World Half Marathon, shirtless and looking ridiculously pleased with himself. Will dislikes them both, but can’t say why.

Mapp runs through a series of similar photos for a third man. “Suspicion arose after door-to-doors revealed that this man was not recognized by anyone in the local rope community. Family and friends had no knowledge of this being a hobby for him, and the hard point used was freshly installed; plaster dust was found both on the floor and on the victim. Now all three deaths are being treated as suspicious. Washington bundled them up and sent them to us. So,” she concludes, “Here we are, ladies and gentlemen. With a distinct paucity of information. I suggest you all research or perhaps simply refresh yourselves on bondage. Any remaining Carpenter reports in my inbox by 7pm, please and thank you. Dismissed.”

 

Lake catches up with Mapp just outside her office. “Agent Mapp, may I speak candidly?”

“Of course,” Mapp replies. “Come in and sit down.” As usual, she leaves the door slightly ajar, though, when Lake hovers by it, she adds, “You can shut the door if you’d prefer more privacy.”

“Oh– no, sorry.” Lake scurries over to join Mapp at her desk.

“How are things, Agent Lake?” Mapp inquires once they’re both seated.

“Pretty good, I suppose.” Her hands flutter nervously in her lap. “The boys and I were talking earlier…”

“Oh?”

“I just wanted to make sure you know we’re all behind you.”

Though she _has_ noticed that Lake’s voice has become slightly less timorous since she’d begun working with them on the Carpenter case, Mapp is still pleasantly surprised. Lake takes plenty of initiative in the field, but generally does so unobtrusively, and is mousy when she presents her findings. Mapp smiles, thanks Lake, and waits for the young agent to continue.

“It’s just… the OIG have poked around here before, looking for scapegoats. They’re not kind to department heads.”

“Yes. And the department’s track record since my arrival doesn’t look great on paper.”

“They give you a rough time about numbers, but… they don’t know what it’s like. You’re good for this place and everyone here knows it.” She attempts to neutralize the unfamiliar fervour in her voice by lowering her eyes.

Mapp, too, suppresses the swell of gratitude in her chest with a hand over her heart. She feels it fluttering as much as Lake’s hands. “Woman-to-woman, I’ll admit, I  _am_  a little scared.”

“You are?” Lake looks like she doesn’t believe her.

“This whole office-field liaising thing is one hell of a balancing act. I could end up with both the JD  _and_  this department furious with me. I watched the career of a close friend collapse because she said the wrong thing to the wrong person  _once_.”

“The OIG people make the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end, but you don’t have to worry about the team being upset. Anyway, you know Ms. Prurnell, right? You can handle it.”

“Yes. Well. I have to believe I got this job for reasons beyond affirmative action, though the others up for the promotion would tell you otherwise.”

Lake just says, “Wow.”

 

Zeller and Price are bickering in the lab when Mapp and Lake join them a little while later.

“Anything to share, gentlemen?”

“Maybe,” Price replies. “If Zee here is done kink-shaming the poor fellow.”

“I’m not– I was just saying, you know…”

“Zee thinks he asked for it.”

Lake sidles around the gurney and bumps shoulders with Zeller. “Why?”

“’Cause there’s no sign of a struggle! No defensive wounds. He asphyxiated. Erotically. Or, you know, auto-erotically.”

“I thought the whole reason we’re looking into this is because accidental death was ruled out,” Lake rebuts without hesitation, though her eyes remain demurely downcast.

“Okay, maybe he didn’t do it to himself, but, I mean,  _murder_? Come on. There are easier ways to kill people.”

“No doubt,” Mapp agrees. “But what if the killer is more interested in art than ease?”

“If he’s going for art, he could’ve picked better-looking subjects,” Zeller mutters.

“Maybe it’s not a  _he_ ,” Lake suggests.

“That’s statistically unlikely,” Price puts in.

“ _Thank_  you,” says Zeller.

Lake pursues the idea. “Is it, though? How many black widows have there been? The victims are all men. What about women like Aileen Wuornos, or Janie Lou Gibbs?”

“Or the female half of husband-wife crime teams,” Mapp adds.

“Okay,” Zeller admits. “Good point,  _but_  – nobody was poisoned, stabbed, or shot here. I mean, this looks like a lot of work. I’m not being sexist or anything, it’s just,  _statistically_ , men are larger and stronger than women, right?”

“The killer wouldn’t necessarily have to be strong. The whole setup is basically a pulley system,” Price reminds them.

“ _Thank_ you.” Lake gives Zeller a cheeky smile.

“Relax, Zee.” Price pats his arm. “No one is accusing you of being sexist. Vanilla, maybe.”

“Hey…” Zeller begins to protest, then shrugs and says, “Yeah, I guess.”

Mapp is evidently amused, but steers them back on track. “Perhaps we should wait for the coroner’s report before calling this a sex crime?”

Zeller and Price look at each other sheepishly.

“Agent Lake, you seem to be thinking a bit more clearly than the rest of us at the moment. Will you please find and interview pertinent groups existing in the vicinity? If you happen to find a willing expert on this kind of practice, you have my permission to bring them in for a consult.”

Zeller smirks. “Can’t you just ask Will? Doesn’t he know his knots?”

“ _You_  can ask him,” Lake retorts. “I’ll text him that you’re waiting in the lab.”

Zeller rolls his eyes. “I just meant ’cause he’s a fisherman. Jeez.”

She chuckles. “I know. See you this afternoon.” At the door to the lab, she turns and blows him a kiss, then, embarrassed, squeaks, “Bye, Jimmy. Thanks, Agent Mapp,” and disappears.

Price elbows Zeller and teases, “You weren’t implying anything? Not even wishfully? I’m sure Liza would understand if you wanted to picture him all tied up…”

“Alright, you two,” Mapp chides, hiding her smile behind an exasperated eye-roll. “I’ll be in my office. Please don’t spend  _all_  morning gossiping.”

 


	5. Clockwork Oranging

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More Team Sassy Science, sciencing sassily.

“Come in, Will,” Mapp invites, when he joins her, Price, and Zeller in her office late that afternoon. “I think we’re just about done here, though. The other two bodies should be on their way, and Agent Lake will be back soon as well.”

“She went to talk to a couple of the local dojos,” Price informs him.

“Turns out she likes field work, and is pretty damn good at it,” Zeller announces proudly.

Will hands Mapp his summary report. She doesn’t put it down right away, but stands with it in one hand, thoughtfully drumming her nails on the glossy cover with the other.

“Need any help in the lab?” Will asks the room at large, despite presumably being the  _last_  person they’d want help from.

Perhaps Price hadn’t submitted an incident report yet, though, because Zeller queries around a yawn, “Know how to do a comprehensive particulate analysis?”

“I’m a forensics specialist. You’ve seen my diploma.”

“Didn’t you use that to mend a crack in the ceiling paper?”

“That was my bachelor’s degree.”

Agent Mapp lets out a startled laugh, as though she’d heard something she wasn’t supposed to, but the amusement was surprised out of her before she could repress it.

With a dull ache in his chest, Will recalls that Abigail used to laugh the same way when he said things like that.

Thankfully, Zeller begins an animated explanation of postural asphyxia, and watching Price grouchily allow his limbs to be manipulated offers a welcome distraction from the depressing line of thought.

The phone rings. Mapp goes to her desk to answer it, and, while listening to the speaker on the other end, aligns the report cover with the edge of the desk.

Will looks away.

“That was Agent Lake. Washington is here with the transport.”

“Hooray,” Price says sarcastically.

“Yes. I’d better go down and meet them. I’ll catch up with you all in the lab. Agent Lake has the coroner’s reports, and the bodies await.”

“Good luck, Boss.”

“Have fun.”

“Thank you, gentlemen. Out, please, so I can lock up.”

 

Will digs his fingers into the palm of his hand as he follows Zeller and Price down to the lab. The blister there still stings, and he is grateful for it.

“Where’s my coffee?” Lake teases when they arrive empty-handed.

“I miss having interns for that reason, alone,” Zeller grumbles. “Do we not get those anymore?”

“No,” Will pitches in. “Price scared them all off.”

“Do you _want_ coffee?” Zeller asks Lake seriously.

“Always.”

“Anyone else?”

“Always,” Price agrees.

“Yeah, thanks,” Will answers, somewhat startled into accepting the offer. “I guess that means we’re going to be here a while?”

Price taps the side of his nose.

“On your way back, can you grab my report? I left it in my locker…” Lake pulls a key ring out of the pocket of her lab coat and holds it out to Zeller hopefully.

Zeller doesn’t even blink. “Sure,” he replies without hesitation. He takes the keys from her and swoops down for a kiss. “If you promise to meet me at said locker later.”

Lake goes hilariously pink, and Price complains, “Oh, for Pete’s sake!”

Zeller leaves the lab guffawing to himself.

“What are you doing to him?” Price shakes his head in wonderment. “Actually, spare me the intimate details,” he says, snapping on a pair of gloves, “but, whatever it is, please keep doing it. Offering to go on a coffee run… my  _God_.”

Lake, still a little flushed, giggles and opens up her laptop on the workbench. “Do you mind staying a couple hours?” she asks Will.

“Not at all. Just not sure how much use I’ll be.”

“Scary Dr. Price will put you to work.” She gives him a shy smile, dons her reading glasses, and begins pecking away at the keyboard.

“Hrm.” Price unzips the first body bag. “Have a look at the autopsy notes, would you, Will?”

 _No dexterity required._   _Good._ Lake pushes two manila envelopes towards him across the desk, still absorbed in transcribing her own notes. Will pulls up a chair and gets reading, repeating key points out loud for Price’s benefit. Zeller returns with a drinks tray as Will is coming to the end of the first report. He stacks Lake’s report atop his and Price’s, and she gives him a short, sweet thank you kiss.

“Cause of death determined to be postural asphyxiation. You were right.” Will nods at Zeller. Skimming over the other report, he confirms, “Second case, too.”

Not for the first time, Mapp enters the lab looking peeved, and the three of them suspect straightaway that she’s being antagonized, once again, by bureaucracy. She confirms this immediately. “Okay, who wants to talk to the press?”

No hands are raised.

“And tell them what?” Price pipes up.

“That this horrible thing happened to an unidentified youngish man, but it’s maybe okay, because he was  _maybe_  a serial killer, maybe?” Zeller crosses his arms, possibly to forestall any expressive flailing. “But we don’t know for sure because we don’t have the budget to keep looking?”

“That’s the stuff.” Agent Mapp gives him a faint smile.

“You’ll be great, Boss,” Price encourages brightly. “Shut ’em up good.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice? Agent Lake, when you’re ready…”

“Yes, ma’am.” Lake folds up her reading glasses and shuts her laptop.

Zeller removes his hands from Lake’s shoulders and sits next to her. Mapp takes a seat next to Will, and Price closes up the cadaver cabinets and joins them.

“All I could find within driving distance is the  _Femme Flight Baltimore Dojo_. They’re an all-female group of bondage and aerial artists. It was… intimidating.”

“Kinky,” Zeller and Price intone simultaneously, waggling their eyebrows.

“Not really,” Lake laughs. “I was mostly asking about safety protocols.”

“And what did you learn?” Mapp prompts.

Will can’t help but watch Zeller’s face as Lake explains, in her shy way, that bent eye bolts are never used for suspension. He’s gazing at her with such softness in his eyes, he hardly looks like the same person.

“The third man might have just made a mistake if he were an amateur,” Lake continues. “But the first two had proper hard points installed, so it might not even be relevant.”

“So… They’re definitely  _not_  all accidents… But they’re  _not_  definitely all  _not_  accidents?”

“Pretty much. Well said, Jimmy.”

Mapp drums her fingernails on the benchtop – something she’s been doing a lot of lately. “The timeline on this bothers me.”

Lake nods in agreement. “It might make a bit more sense if the third body was found first – like the killer saw an amateur mistake lead to a fatal accident and thought,  _That’s a way to do it_.”

Mapp massages her neck thoughtfully. “It’s time to go home,” she decides. “We can get a fresh start on this tomorrow after we’ve all read the file. Agent Lake, will you please email us your notes from today?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Thank you. And I might ask you boys to do a second autopsy. Be prepared.”

“You got it, Boss.”

Mapp sees the three reports sitting at the end of the bench and goes to leaf through them.

“Learn anything else?” Zeller whispers to Lake, quiet enough that Mapp can’t make out the words, but Will and Price can.

Lake whispers back, “ _A knot in the eye is decidedly unerotic_.”

“A knot in the eye? How’s that?”

“I’ll show you, if you like.” Liza giggles. “Give me a rope long enough, and a hook from which to hang it, and I can string up a grouchy scientist.”

“That’s  _not_  how the saying goes…”

 

The following morning, Will stares at the kettle full of freshly boiled water on the stovetop for some time, fingers wrapped around the handle. His ability to replace the imaginary pain with real physical discomfort is a secret Will tries not to think about directly, as though doing so would shed light on the loophole he’d found in his situation, and the universe would take it away. He averts his eyes and collapses his wrist, searing the heel of his hand on the heated metal. While the blessed rush of adrenaline lasts, he quickly dresses and goes to wait outside for Liza.

Liza’s friendly face is an even more welcome sight than usual this morning. She gives him a sunny smile and chirps, “Morning, Will.”

“Morning.” He climbs into the car with a travel mug full of coffee, hoping he’d remembered correctly how she likes it. He adamantly ignores the idea that forgetting something he’d learned only yesterday might be a problem.

She relieves him of the mug, and tilts her head sympathetically when she sees the fresh bandage on his hand. “Burn not healed yet, huh?”

“Not quite.” He changes the subject immediately. “So, you’re going to start calling me Will finally?”

“I’m going to try it out. It just feels weird.”

“You’re not so shy these days.”

“I’m trying not to be. It’s hard though. People make me real nervous.”

“Me too.”

“I think dating Zee is helping a lot. He’s so funny, most of the time I just forget to feel awkward. Thank you for the coffee, by the way,” she adds, taking a grateful sip and slurping slightly.

“It’s nothing,” Will deflects, shifting a little in his seat, embarrassed that he hadn’t thought to start making her coffee sooner. “You’re doing him good, too,” he comments after a minute or so of not uncomfortable quiet.

She smiles modestly. “Thanks. You don’t like each other much, do you?”

“I annoy him. He’s not alone in his opinion of me.”

“I don’t know why you get under his skin. Jimmy likes you just fine. So do I.”

“I think that might actually contribute to his disliking me.”

She chuckles.

“You two are pretty serious, huh?”

Liza blushes and nods. “Kind of crazy about him…”

He opens his mouth to respond, but makes sure he has something better than  _nice_  to say, first. “That’s really sweet.”

Her blush deepens, and she bites her lip to keep from outright grinning. It warms and saddens Will at the same time. With attempted airiness, she changes the subject. “Last day of exams, huh?”

“That’s right.”

“Think you’ll take a holiday?”

“Depends, I guess.”

“On the case?”

“On the case.”

“Maybe the killer will take a holiday…”

It isn’t difficult to smile at her. “Maybe we’ll catch him first.”

“Yeah,” she says, smiling back. “Let’s do that.”

At a stop light about twenty minutes out from Quantico, Liza removes the lid on the travel mug and starts gulping down her coffee in earnest.

“Fueling up?”

She nods. “If Jimmy and Zee are poking around in the bodies, that means I’m on paperwork. It’s either fuel up, or Clockwork Orange my eyes open.”

Will frowns slightly. “Are you not sleeping well?”

“Oh.” Liza is suddenly uncomfortable. Clearly that wasn’t her point, but, found out, she admits, “I guess it’s a little harder to get to sleep…” Then she brightens again and laughs. “That’s probably all the coffee though.”

“Having to drop the Ghost case really bothered you, huh?”

She lifts one shoulder slightly. “It’s not like I haven’t been on a case that went cold before…”

“Sometimes–” Will stops and clears his throat, feeling that it’s very important he say the right thing. “Sometimes a particular case will get to you and you can’t say why.”

She just nods. A few minutes later, she confides, voice soft and shy again, “I wish you’d been a teacher when I was still in school.”

He turns to look at her, eyebrows raised in unchecked surprise.

“I have a couple friends finishing up at the academy,” Liza explains. “They say you’re depressing as hell.” She laughs apologetically. “But they feel prepared for, I guess… this.”

Will is touched by this but, once again, the feeling is lined with sadness.

 

“It seems we’re looking for an opportunist more than anything,” Price is theorizing aloud, when Will joins them in the lab that afternoon.

Zeller is nodding, his arms folded across his chest. “If he’s looking for recognition, it’s from a very specific audience. Or  _she_ ,” he adds, with particular emphasis to Lake.

“If you’ll allow it, Agent Mapp, I’d like to go out to Orlando and San Fran,” Lake proposes timidly. “I could talk to the groups out there and see what they know about the victims. Maybe track down if they made new friends recently... That kind of thing.”

“Yes,” Mapp concurs. “I think you’d better do that. You can fly out tomorrow morning, and I’d like you back by Friday evening.”

“You don’t mind me missing the press conference?”

“I don’t wish attendance on any of you,” Mapp replies dryly.

“Zee and I will go, sweetie,” Price assures Lake. “Not that the Boss needs us to or anything.”

Mapp actually chuckles a little bit. “I’m touched by your confidence in my public speaking abilities.”

Will’s brain is itching from the words  _opportunist_  and  _recognition_  when Mapp says, “Agent Zeller, care to summarize today’s findings for Will?”

“Simple,” Zeller pronounces. “We’re about as sure as we can be that the first two weren’t accidents. They would have had to be dumb as shit.” His hands start moving involuntarily, and he once again enlists Price as the model victim. “Hyperflexion of the neck, hips, and knees, and the inverted face-down position put all sorts of pressure on the diaphragm – pretty unsexy. It would be impossible to recover from oxygen deficits brought on by, say, their  _asthma_ , or  _pre-existing pulmonary condition_ , which they had.”

“So, not likely they tangled themselves up,” Will recaps, struggling to focus.

“Like I said, they’d have to be dumb as shit not to have someone else there to cut ’em down. And these are pretty sophisticated knots, so, we’re pretty sure they  _weren’t_ dumb as shit. Liza can double-check that when she talks to their friends.”

Will thinks he gives some sort of verbal acknowledgement, but he’s distracted by the thing grating against his mind. What is he trying to remember?  _Opportunism. The method of murder is less important than the simple fact that these people die..._ _What Lawrence Wells has to do with anything escapes Will for the time being._

“Right,” Mapp declares. “One more order of business. Who wants to accompany me to a wedding?”

Two hands instantly shoot into the air. They belong to Price and Zeller.

Liza giggles, Will snorts, and Mapp raises her eyebrows and says, “Goodness. I misjudged that.”

“Maybe they should flip for it,” Liza suggests.

“Good idea. Let me know who the lucky man is. Will, walk with me?”

As they head out together, they hear Price cackling, and imagine he’s just won something to lord over Zeller for all time.

 

The weather is a seasonal hybrid. It’s the time of year no one is quite sure how to dress for. It is bright and dry out, but the occasional gust of wind has a chilly bite to it. Ardelia and Will walk briskly to her car. Liza’s is parked close-by. She retrieves the jacket she’d left on the seat. The early morning sun had already heated the dark leather interior before she’d even left this morning, and by the time she had reached the office, she was too warm. She slips it back on now.

“I just wanted to ask how you like Dr. Harris – is he a good fit for you?”

Will grimaces, but she is busy doing up her buttons and doesn’t see. “I don’t know,” he answers weakly.

“I don’t know him personally. But he’s very practiced. Sticks with the tried and true.” She looks over at him and smiles. “I thought you might appreciate the simplicity of his approach. It’s my understanding that you’ve had some rather unconventional therapy in the past.”

“To say the least,” Will mumbles.

Ardelia opens the trunk and puts both her satchel and file box inside, before inclining her head to the lobby of the BAU HQ and suggesting, “Coffee?”

Will nods and follows her lead, even though he knows this catch-up session can only end with himself getting in trouble.

“What are you going to say at the press conference tomorrow?” he dares to ask, before her line of questioning can continue.

They sit at a small table by the window. It’s more ornamental than anything. It barely fits their two mugs, and looks in danger of toppling over. “Besides  _Lord help us all_?”

“Yeah, after you say what we’re all thinking.”

“The truth, I suppose.” She sighs. “As much of it as we know, anyway.”

“The truth isn’t very comforting.”

“I don’t necessarily expect the truth to reach the public’s ears unadulterated.”

“No,” Will agrees. “The media wouldn’t be doing their job, then.”

“Goodness, Will. You’d think the press had treated you badly at some point.”

Will scoffs lightly, and drinks his coffee black. Ardelia stirs two sugars into hers. He looks away.

“Speaking of doing one’s job,” Ardelia continues. “Is Dr. Harris any good at his?”

Will shrugs. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

“Objectively, I mean. You know all the tricks. Tell me what you think of him. Should I recommend his services to others in the department?”

Will hides behind his coffee, but there’s only one gulp left, after which he reluctantly lowers the empty mug.

“I see,” Ardelia says evenly. She is twisting the ring on her finger when Will raises his eyes. “You don’t know because you haven’t been going to your appointments.”

“Basically.” He listens to her take a steadying breath, desperately wanting to refill his mug so he can keep holding it instead of finding something else to do with his hands. It doesn’t help that, once she’s finished with _her_ coffee, she simply folds her hands on the table in front of her.

“This is not okay, Will.”

Will just stares at her hands, the delicate cross-hatch of her laced fingers.

“I expected our deal to be taken seriously.”

“It’s not that I didn’t take it seriously…” he begins, then realizes he has nothing to follow it up with. Really, what had he been planning to say when she found out?

She watches him expectantly, eyes ever-so-slightly narrowed. She’s giving him a chance to explain, but that window is closing. After a few moments, she sets her elbow on the table and presses her fingertips to her lips. She winces at the late afternoon sun thrown into her eyes by this change in posture.

“I don’t need anyone else trying to get into my head,” he mumbles at length.

She looks back at him. “Have you been to  _any_  sessions?”

“No,” he admits to the hand she still has lying on the table.

Her eyes have some softness in them still, but her expression has hardened along with her voice. “I should have enforced this sooner. I’ve always been inclined towards leniency with you. I hope you’re not intentionally abusing that.”

“I’m not,” he hastens to say, though he knows they’ll just be empty words to her now.

“It’s past the point where that matters, Will. I’m officially worried.”

The next words that leave his mouth make him want to cut out his own tongue. “You sound like Jack,” he blurts out. He closes his eyes and buries his face in his hands.  _What a disaster_.

Ardelia takes another steadying breath. “Whatever that was an accusation of, doesn’t excuse you,” she states firmly.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters into his hands.

They are quiet for several minutes, Will staring at the table between his elbows, and Ardelia staring out the window. Her lips are pressed into a hard line. She looks tired. “I think Agent Lake is coming to look for you,” Ardelia observes tonelessly.

Will sighs and stands.

Ardelia, hands once again folded in front of her, and gaze once again resting on her ring, sighs as well. “I’m suspending you until you show commitment to your part of the contract,” she states, turning her face up to look at him. Her tone is final, though her voice is soft, and she looks him in the eye when she gives the order. “Please leave your badge and gun.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by my beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr). She has redefined the term "beta-ing" to include providing indispensable insight, support, suggestions, critiques, and generally going above and beyond what would be expected of any editor. She is also my friend, partner, and roommate in the Hannibal Trash dumpster. I love this woman.
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
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	6. Intensely Drunk, Immensely Hungover

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will deals with his termination by getting stupendously shit-faced. Hannibal somehow continues to be charming while perving on Ardelia. As Kate pointed out, he needs to get laid something awful.

Hannibal arrives at the Robert F. Kennedy building well after the press conference has ended, donning the harried air of someone who  _isn’t_  exactly where they want to be exactly when they want to be there. He spots Agent Mapp immediately, and the clicking of his shoes against the marble of the lobby floor highlights the briskness of the pace at which he crosses it. Tapping his way up the staircase, he joins her with a show of being ever-so-slightly out of breath.

Mapp is leaning with her elbows on the balustrade, watching the media stragglers still milling about with narrowed eyes. The ones with the ludicrous notion that, if they could only get the section chief on her own, she might divulge something juicy – or simply make something up.

“ _The place of justice is a hallowed place_ ,” Mapp comments sardonically, cognizant of the irony in her situation.

Following her lead, Hannibal dispenses with the formal greeting and, sharing her disapproval, tuts at the figures below. After an appropriate amount of time has passed, he says, “I’m sorry I was not here sooner.”

“No apology necessary. I’m glad to have had one less witness to this nonsense.”

“Was it so bad?”

“Not as bad as it could have been,” Mapp allows. “They want answers I just don’t have, so they got bored rather quickly.”

“All the same, I would have liked to be here, to offer what little support I can.”

“Agents Zeller and Price said much the same thing. You’re all rather lovely that way.” She smiles, and something like a sigh escapes her. “I take it you haven’t had any luck, referral-wise?”

“I have a few patients who simply refuse to see another psychiatrist. In their minds, only the elderly retire. I suppose I should be flattered.”

Mapp chuckles. “Oh dear…”

“I must admit, I have a soft spot for one or two of them. I agreed to taper their sessions, but the process has been significantly more gradual than I anticipated.”

“You’re weaning them off you? That’s very generous.”

“Fortunately, I can afford to be generous with my time.”

She turns to face him then, one arm still resting on the railing. “I’ve been meaning to ask why you decided to retire in the first place. Are you planning on writing more?” At the quizzical tilt of Hannibal’s head, the corners of Mapp’s mouth twitch upwards. “Yes, I’ve been poking around in some psychiatric journals.”

Hannibal considers her question for a moment or two. “Yes, I think that was a large part of my decision. It’s difficult to contribute to academia while running a full-time practice.”

“You’re quite prolific already. I have to say, I’m impressed.”

Hannibal responds with a warm smile and some more apparent reflection. “If I’m completely honest, the desire to continue psychiatric work left me several months before I started referring patients, but I lacked the courage, then, to officially retire.”

“This was before Will’s stroke?”

Hannibal nods. “I certainly felt I could retire  _then_. In fact, I felt it necessary.”

Aware that  _now what?_ is not an appropriate question, Mapp simply hums an acknowledgement and returns to her observation of the reporters below. The number has dwindled, but she knows that, to the few who remain, this is an endurance test that only grows more competitive with each contestant that drops out.

Hannibal, too, is observing, though the subject of his attention is Agent Mapp. He is more covert about studying her this time, a task easily accomplished with his peripheral vision. The combination of a pale blue button-up blouse and grey pencil skirt make her look quite ordinary – no doubt the effect she was striving for. Her dreadlocks are swept back into a low knot and she is wearing neutral coloured lipstick and modest black pumps. He closes his eyes for a moment, preoccupied with the thought that he would like to take her home, and see her in a floor length skirt and dangly earrings again.

At length, Mapp suggests, “You could travel. Isn’t that what retirees look forward to?”

“It has its appeal. I certainly intend to return to Italy at some point,” Hannibal muses. Quieter, he adds, “I would have liked to take Will and Sarah, but that is neither here nor there.”

“Maybe you’ll get that chance again.”

“Perhaps that hope is the real reason I can’t bring myself to retire fully.”

Both teasing and sympathetic, Mapp offers, “I’m happy to give you more work if you need an excuse to stay.”

Hannibal and Ardelia remain on the landing for some time after the last reporters finally slink off in defeat. The fading light gives the interior of the Justice building a cathedral-like glow, and the murals and statues in the main entrance only serve to enhance the effect. That is not what interests Hannibal, however, as it is nothing in comparison to the Capella Palatina, or frankly any other noteworthy house of God he’s visited. He is once again studying Ardelia’s hands where they rest clasped together on the dark wooden railing. Gazing at her long fingers folded over the opposite knuckles, Hannibal has renewed interest in uncovering any musical capabilities she may have.

He decides that the Justice building and its insignificant inhabitants have held Ardelia’s attention long enough. “Shall we?”

Ardelia starts, having fallen into somewhat of a stupor. “That depends on what you have in mind.”

“I imagine you want to go home,” Hannibal asserts. “I could cook for you there if you’d like.”

“That sounds wonderful, though I can’t promise to be good company.”

Will had made his own way to Quantico that morning. If Liza wasn’t away she might have picked him up one last time, but he doesn’t want to think about that. Once the last of his grading was done and submitted and his desk packed up, he’d called a cab and hidden in his office to wait for it. He was not keen on encountering any of the team members in general, but he was especially determined not to run into Agent Mapp. Though it was past 2pm, and she was certainly on her way to Washington by now, the very idea of seeing her – seeing the disappointment written all over her face – is unbearable. He’d let her down, and now there was nothing to do but regret it. He didn’t need help with that.

Once back in Wolf Trap, he punishes himself by working outside in the cold. The sky is a tumultuous grey and, even in the semi-shelter of the shed, the wind nips at his forearms and neck. It rattles the loose boards and the broken lock, and makes the whole structure creak. Later, in an act of senseless, targetless defiance, and knowing full well a storm is on its way, he mows the small patch of lawn between his porch and the great tree out front. He defers the task of renting a tuxedo until tomorrow, and retreats back inside for the evening.

He wakes an hour or two later to find that it is completely dark out. He’d dreamt of a turbulent spring, and of looking for Abigail beneath the swirling eddies. She should have been with him, but when the water stilled, he was alone.

Back at her house, Ardelia excuses herself and goes upstairs to change. When she rejoins Hannibal, already at work in the kitchen, she is, indeed, wearing a long, flowing skirt, but he is disappointed to see she has forgone the earrings.

Hannibal has already uncorked a bottle of wine and is letting it breathe on the countertop while he buffs two long-stemmed glasses.

Ardelia frowns slightly in confusion. “Did you bring wine?”

“Amongst other things.” He smiles before explaining, “I had thought to make you dinner, by way of apologizing for my tardiness.”

Her frown disappears, but the prospect of having someone serve her in her own home seems to revive the discomfort she’d exhibited at their last dinner. “You’re a man of great foresight, I see.” Then, when he offers her a glass, she declines almost shyly. “I’d better not.” Not to be rude, she qualifies, “I imagine there will be plenty of wine-drinking at the wedding.”

Before she can resort to fiddling with her ring, Hannibal shoos her back into the living room with the promise that he has dinner under control. Fifteen or so minutes later, he emerges from the kitchen to find Ardelia scrolling through her phone, feet tucked up next to her on the couch. She looks up right away.

“Reading anything of interest?”

“Agent Lake landed an hour ago,” Ardelia informs him. “She’s sent me transcripts of the interviews.” She rubs her eyes. “I shouldn’t be doing this right now,” she apologizes. “Let me just message her quickly. She may need reminding that she and Agent Zeller are not to be at work this weekend while the rest of us enjoy  _a day of lavishness and hedonism_  – Agent Price’s words,” she concludes, with an irrepressible grin.

Hannibal’s smile is wide and amused. When she slips her phone into the pocket of her skirt, however, he settles it slightly and imparts doubt and concern with his eyes. “You look quite tired, Ardelia. Why don’t you sleep? You have a little while before dinner is ready.”

She shakes her head and stands. “You were going to help me make a centrepiece for my table.” While she stretches, she casts her eyes about the room for an empty sweetgrass basket. “You were quite adamant, last time, that my table needed it.” She gives him a warm and playful, if tired smile. “I’m sure the fresh air will wake me up.”

Alone in Wolf Trap, Will mixes up some fresh food for the dogs and lets them out. He has little energy for anything else. He eats dry toast standing at the kitchen counter, then lets the dogs back in and pours himself a good, stiff drink.

“There’s not much greenery out here this time of year.” Handing a pair of secateurs to Hannibal and tucking the basket under one arm, Ardelia leads the way over the slightly sloped back garden to a small stand of Virginia pines.

“A beautiful display can be achieved just with a few sprigs of evergreen.” Hannibal’s voice is once again low and intimate. “My aunt, Lady Murasaki, taught me much about the ancient Japanese art of Ikebana. She could communicate an evening’s worth of sentiments with a single arrangement.”

“Lady Murasaki… Can I assume she married into the family?”

Hannibal chuckles. “Yes. She was the wife of my late uncle, Robertus. I lived with them for a time in Paris.”

“Why, then, of the seven to nine languages you know, is Japanese one that needs work?”

“We haven’t spoken in a very long time,” Hannibal answers simply.

Ardelia doesn’t pry. Instead, while Hannibal clips a few sprigs of pine, she pinches off a couple shoots each of stonecrop and goldenrod. Hannibal nods in approval.

“ _Sedum_  and  _Soligado_  – both are symbolic of endurance and fortitude.”

“Well, they certainly don’t get any help from me,” she chortles. “ _Soligado canadensis_ , I believe – is that right?”

“You know more than you let on. I hope you’re not simply indulging me while you suffer in tedium.”

Ardelia laughs aloud. “I promise you, I’m not. The only reason I know that is because my grandma told me it’s a weed, but I couldn’t be bothered to get rid of it. Gardening is not exactly my forte.” She runs her hand through the thicket of fluffy-looking yellow panicles. “Besides, it’s pretty.” Something catches her eye, then, and she crouches, leaning forward to pluck something invisible to Hannibal. When she sits back on her heels, she is holding a single sprig of winter heather.

She is very lovely, looking up at him, waiting to be told its significance. Hannibal is duly charmed, not to mention pleased with her finding. He cocks his head to the side and says, “Our arrangement will certainly have a theme,” with what he intends to be a sad sort of smile.

Her gaze is questioning and she too cocks her head to one side. The movement, though small, is unrestrained.

“ _Solitude_.”

Ardelia nods and rises, taking Hannibal’s hand when he offers it.

With a calculated pause in lieu of a segue, he remarks, “You fired Will yesterday.”

She looks at him squarely. “Yes.”

“Thank you.” Hannibal takes a steps towards her until he can easily clasp her shoulder in gratitude. He doesn’t let go of her hand.

Ardelia’s gaze drifts away and she looks out over the floodplains in silence. “I didn’t do it for you,” she says at last.

Hannibal is momentarily unsure how to respond – it doesn’t quite sound like something she’d say. It sounds like something Will would say. However, after a moment, she qualifies the comment in the resolute manner she uses to address self-doubt. “I’d like to think I did it for Will, but, maybe I did it for myself.”

Hannibal’s hand slides down her arm and comes to rest above her elbow. “I don’t think so, Ardelia.” He decides the statement will have the greatest effect if he leaves it at that.

Outwardly, Ardelia is neither dismissive of nor discomforted by the frequent touches Hannibal administers throughout the evening. Despite this, he feels certain this is more affection than she has been shown in quite some time. Her reciprocal actions, when they occur, are slightly uncoordinated, as though she is out of practice showing affection, herself. It pleases him to think of the effort she must be making – consciously or otherwise.

“ _Hana-isho_ ,” Hannibal announces, as they set about arranging the stems and blooms in accordance with the tenets of that school, which Hannibal explicates in full while they work. The composition will feature a stark branch of pine on an incline, crossing stems with an upright sprig of heather, inflorescences of stonecrop tucked up against the side, and goldenrod spilling in a delicate trickle over the side of the basket. With this in mind, Hannibal enumerates, at times rather pointedly, the virtues associated with pine.

Ardelia appears interested, but her guarded half-smile prevents him from reading her expression fully. He tells her that pine is the arboreal representation of wisdom and moderation, resilience and strength. That, worlds apart, both the Japanese and the American Indians developed a reverence for the steadfastness and longevity of the tree. That it is viewed in many cultures, including ancient ones, as an emblem of enlightenment, symbolizing the quietly determined continuity of life. What he doesn’t tell her, is that pine is not cut lightly.

_ Thrilling and boundless, the possibilities of pine. _

It is late, now, and Will is intensely drunk. He sits at the kitchen table, face pressed against the cool window pane. Rain is streaming down the glass like trails of fluorescent paint against the black canvas of the night. He sees a nose print on the pane where one of the dogs had jumped up to look out and wonders if they’re waiting for Abigail to come home, too. He pours another drink, turning out all the lights but the one over the stove, and sitting back down. As this drink is consumed, something begins to blossom in his swimming vision.

In the chair across from him is the shape of her, and he hears the whisper of tiny black feathers. He tries to make the image coalesce, to see a face. She doesn’t move, but, faceless, faces him with palpable attention. Not wanting to waste this opportunity, he tries to reason with her, but his words are as formless as her face. Pathetically, he manages, fatigued to an almost child-like state, “You just gotta come back now, okay?”

He leans across the table, his hand extended to reach her, but the focus of his gaze scatters her form, and all the little pieces of her dart to the corners of the room and remain there, with the shadows. He puts his head down, cheek pillowed on his arm, gaze once again on the window and the flats beyond – unrecognizable as they are pelted with rain and wind.

For a moment, he imagines he can see Abigail on the other side of the glass, a faint and flickering apparition – closer, and yet farther away. She is only inches from him, but all he can make out is an empty face with drops crawling through it down the glass. Eyeless. A face full of rain.

Hannibal continues to study Ardelia throughout the evening. At times, he is transfixed by the curve of her ear. At others, by the soft skin of her shoulder, and the angle of her collar bone.

As he plates their dinners, he questions her about her neighbours, feigning ignorance of the fact that the topic will make her uncomfortable. “I assume this kitchen is a shared space with whoever lives next door?”

“ _Lived._  Starling. So, no, not anymore.”

“You bought it?”

“I made sure it never even went on the market. I couldn’t bear it.”

“Good.”

“Is it? Don’t answer that. I’d rather talk about almost anything else.”

“You’re a good friend,” he assures her gently. “That’s all I meant.”

Hannibal doesn’t quite make it to the table before she stands and takes her plate, suggesting, with forced indifference, that they eat in the living room tonight. Her tone is casual, but, all of a sudden, she seems keen to distance herself from the other side of the duplex. He notes that her skin is visibly flushed, and clavicle slightly starker with building tension. He nods once and gestures for her to lead the way, deciding this is a story for another time.

Will’s hand hovers over the bottle and he believes he is deliberating, but another drink sloshes into his glass before he is done doing so. It is as easy to justify as all the others – immensely easy in the face of what his mind has elected to recall. Namely, the cruel loop of insults exchanged during his fight with Hannibal by the stream – the one that had pushed Abigail into leaving.

_ Himself, challenging Hannibal to do to him what he does to his victims. _

_ Hannibal’s infuriating reply: “I will not make you more of a victim than you have already allowed yourself to be.” _

_ Himself, demanding once more, “You think I want this?” _

_ Hannibal, pouncing on the invitation. “I’m beginning to see that you don’t.” _

_ And, finally, Hannibal’s addendum of scathing words he can’t ever forget: “I should have left you in the hospital.” _

It doesn’t matter what apologies, real or imagined, were swapped after that. Before his mind can go through the whole thing again, for the hundredth time, he downs the rest of his drink and stumbles heavily to bed, seeking, instead, the dreams that lie coiled beneath his pillow.

****

“Would you like to talk about the press conference?”

“There’s not much to tell. Because there wasn’t much to tell,” Ardelia answers with a wry smile.

Hannibal rests his arm along the back of the sofa. Ardelia has once again tucked her feet up beneath her. For a drinkless situation, they are oddly at ease. Hannibal wonders how much of her apparent comfort is due to being full, and very tired.

“Really,” Ardelia continues. “It went exactly as I expected it would. I wish I could say the same for anything else.”

“The case?” Hannibal probes. “Which, I must say, you have been impressively stoic about.”

She frowns and nods. Weariness making her even more candid than usual in her reply, she says, “I have seen some shit in my day.”

It is only a momentary lapse in propriety, and, once she apologizes with her eyes, Hannibal hardly cares.

“But this was something else.” Ardelia rests her elbow on the arm of the sofa and her cheek against her hand, closing her eyes as she concludes, “I don’t know… I don’t think I can handle never knowing who he was.”

“Would you like to talk about it?”

She turns her face to him and smiles in appreciation. The movement seems to trigger a yawn, however, so she replies apologetically, “Perhaps some other time.”

By the time Hannibal takes his leave, just a few minutes later, she is struggling to keep her eyes open. On the drive home, he imagines that she didn’t make it up the stairs, but fell asleep on the sofa, instead. He thinks of her pretty feet peeping out from the folds of her skirt, and an elegant hand resting on her chest, rising and falling with each deep breath.

Will dreams, once again, of fiery paths and rippling screens, but there is one significant difference between this dream and all the others. Instead of the clammy, sick feeling he usually endures in this hell between worlds, he is filled with that sweet and easy peace he’d long ago taught himself not to expect. He strolls along the path, unhurried, and, only a little way ahead, hand in hand, walk Dark Abigail and the Wendigo.

He wakes up feeling well-rested and hopeful, until the final scraps of the dreamscape disintegrate. Then, he is wretched with disappointment, and spectacularly hungover. For the rest of the day, he tries hard not to think about why he only sees Abigail in his dreams now. His mind goes there anyway, and his flesh hurts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by my beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr). She has redefined the term "beta-ing" to include providing indispensable insight, support, suggestions, critiques, and generally going above and beyond what would be expected of any editor. She is also my friend, partner, and roommate in the Hannibal Trash dumpster. I love this woman.
> 
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	7. Camp Graham & Camp Lecter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vergram tie the knot at last, allowing Price to spend a whole afternoon being affable and decadent, Will and Hannibal to spend a whole afternoon pretending they're not eye-banging each other, and Judy and Margot to catch a goddam break for... _almost_ a whole afternoon. The dancefloor is populated with some fairly odd couples who make unexpected amends before things go to fucking pieces.

It isn’t only Barney Matthews’s heart that flip flops at the sight of Margot in the shower, hair clinging to the contours of her back before she wrings it out. Though she is lovely to behold anywhere, wearing anything, Judy likes her best just after she turns off the water, looking like Aphrodite rising from the sea.

“What are you doing in here?” Margot asks, toweling herself off.

Judy hums and holds open Margot’s favourite kimono for her. “Just making sure you’re still going to marry me.” Margot slips her arms into the sleeves with a small, puzzled smile. While Judy wraps her up in the hand-spun silk, she says more seriously, “I wanted to see you before you put on your makeup.”

Margot seats herself at the dressing table. She begins brushing her hair nonchalantly, but her eyes are fixed on Judy in the mirror, and her voice quavers with uncertainty. “Why?”

“Because I might cry,” Judy says, coming up behind her and taking the hairbrush. She sets it back down on the table before adding, teasingly, “And if  _I’m_  in danger of crying, you’re a sure thing.”

Margot’s gaze becomes questioning. More so when Judy kneels in front of her and holds both her hands in hers. Where their hands are clasped in Margot’s lap, the fabric wrinkles, and a cluster of silk nandina berries are bunched together further.

“I’ve thought a lot about this day.”

“Me too,” Margot whispers.

“I didn’t think it would be like this…” Judy begins, hesitates, then simply shakes her head and repeats, “I didn’t think it would be like this.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“Are you sure you still want to do this today, even if we’re mad at each other?”

Margot clutches Judy’s hands tight. “I’m not mad at you,” she says, voice quiet and desperate. “I’m mad at myself.”

Judy sits up on her knees so she can cup Margot’s face and kiss it all over. “You’re always mad at yourself. Darling, crazy girl.”

“You’re about to marry crazy...”

“Yes. Because I want you and your crazy with me…” More kisses. “All the time…” Kiss. “Forever. I can’t live without you, Em.”

Margot nods, but doesn’t speak.

Judy wipes the tear tracking down Margot’s cheek away with her thumb and smiles gently. “Aren’t you glad I came in before the eyeliner?”

 

Will appraises the crowd gathered in the great hall of the Verger Mansion, and is thankful he’d bothered to look up what  _black tie_  meant. Though most are seated, there are some people still mingling, or casually walking past the clumps of cameramen and reporters, hoping to be interviewed or praised on their style. Even the media have shown up in dark suits and evening dresses. Among the guests, he is able to see long sweeping gowns, polished shoes, and the glint of diamond earrings or cufflinks, and to deduce that Price was right in calling the event decadent.

Hannibal is seated in the seventh row. In an aisle seat, of course. Will doesn’t know what either of them would have done had there been assigned seating. He mentally thanks whomever was in charge of the planning, with even more gratitude than he had for the part of his brain that told him to rent a tux.

A string septet is playing serene, unobtrusive music that people can still hold conversations against. When they begin playing louder, the well-bred guests take their seats, used to this type of non-verbal social instruction.

Margot and Judy enter the room behind Ardelia, and even the most persistent of whispered conversations stop altogether. Margot is in a backless, though otherwise classic wedding dress, with her hair a bouquet of ash-brown curls, and her lace-covered arm ending in a posy of flowers that spills prettily over her hand. Judy is in an ivory-white, three-piece Joseph Altuzarra suit, with both the vest and jacket tapered at the waist and tight fitting over her flat chest. Her hair is pinned in a stylishly asymmetrical roll, and she wears high heels, and lipstick that matches Margot’s. If Abigail were here, she’d note that, once again, they look like a painting come to life.

Will watches the three goddess-like women walk down the aisle, Ardelia scattering white rose petals from a pleated satin basket a few steps ahead of the brides. Will wonders if Abigail was meant to be in the wedding party. Would she have been a flower girl? Would she have been Margot’s maid of honour? By the time he stops thinking about Abigail, the ceremony is well underway.

The vows are short, but with enough flowery stuff to satisfy the press’s expectations, since the whole ceremony is largely for show. Will is sure that not even the most eloquent person in the world could write vows that accurately express the depth of love Margot and Judy have for one another. They smile through all of it, and there is a hint of humour in their twinkling eyes, like they’re in on a joke together.

When they exchange gold bands, however, there is a certain solemnity, and, surprisingly, it is Judy who wipes her eyes. The celebrant announces their union and invites them to kiss. They do, and, suddenly, Margot and Judy are both laughing and crying and holding onto one another, like they haven’t seen each other in months.

Everyone stands and claps. Ardelia kisses them each on the cheek and wipes at her eyes with a huge smile on her face. She says something to them both with her hands pressed over her heart, and then stands aside as they walk back down the aisle, hand in hand.

The great hall clears quickly, the guests and media all wanting their chance to congratulate or interview the newlyweds. Ardelia is glad to see that Jimmy Price hasn’t dashed off to do the same. She takes the seat next to him as people continue milling towards the door, and surreptitiously pulls a tissue from the sleeve of her gown to pat at her slightly sniffly nose.

Price grins at her. “Aw, Boss…”

Ardelia laughs and shakes her head. Pointing a stern finger at him she says, “You’re not to tell anyone at work about this.”

Price chuckles and holds his arms out. Ardelia allows the briefest of hugs. He gives her a little squeeze and she pats his back a couple of times. Then she pulls back and warns, “I  _will_  fire you.”

“Oh, they’re gonna learn what a big softie you are soon enough. Liza and Zee are next, so, if it’s weddings that get you…”

“Really?”

“Any day now, he’s gonna pop the question.”

“It’s absolutely none of my business, but, haven’t they only been seeing each other for a month or two?”

“Yup. It’s true love, though.”

“Seeing as you’re a confidante to both parties, I trust you absolutely.” Ardelia smiles and stands. “Shall we?”

As they meander their way towards the door, Price says, “They’ve been around each other for years. Bev was Liza’s mentor. So, it wasn’t love at first sight or anything… But Zee, said the first time they went out together, he knew. I like that.”

The front hall is even larger than the one they were just in, yet it feels smaller as they take it all in. People are still lining up to take pictures with the brides, but everyone else is already either dancing or eating, and  _everyone_ appears to be drinking. Ornate tables line the walls, looking ready to collapse under the sumptuous spread and the sheer number of champagne fountains. Elegant people, young and old, grace the dancefloor – ballroom dancing, amongst other pastimes of the wealthy, is not part of rich children’s upbringing that is generation-specific.

Price is apparently in his element. They are separated briefly in the throng, and, when Ardelia locates him once more, he is already partnered up on the dancefloor.

 

Will allows himself a moment of shock when he scans the dance floor and sees Hannibal, sweeping across it in a graceful waltz, with none other than Bedelia du Maurier in his arms.

“Are you as surprised as I am?” comes Ardelia’s voice from beside him.

Will turns to her with an arched eyebrow. “Are you surprised?”

“Quite,” she affirms. “I’m not entirely sure what to do.”

They watch the scene in silence for a few seconds.

“Do me a favour, Will.”

“What?”

“Tell me how inappropriate it would be for me to question her at a wedding reception.”

A scoff escapes him. “You’re in trouble if you’re relying on me when it comes to social graces.”

“Let’s dance,” Ardelia suggests.

As usual, it’s not an order, but Will doesn’t think of refusing. Still, she is very close. “You’ll have to lead,” he says, and purposely stumbles so he has a reason to keep his eyes on his feet, rather than her face.

Neither of them having ever learned anything remotely fancy, they stick to simple steps, only changing direction when spatially necessary. “How are you, Will?” she asks when they find their rhythm.

Will can’t help but retort, “How are  _you_ , Ardelia?”

She gives him her funny half-smile and replies, “Careful, Will...”

The teasing tone puts him at ease. “I’m alright,” he admits, and the relative truth of the statement is apparently conveyed, because she pats his shoulder and says, “Good.”

Will sighs. “Everyone knows, don’t they?”

“Knows what?”

“You know.”

“Those who don’t  _know_ , guessed.”

“What’s the lead take on it?”

“When did you start caring about the input of the masses?”

“I don’t. Curious.”

“I’m curious, myself. Trade?”

He lifts the corner of his mouth in acquiescence.

“Well, as one would expect, there is camp Graham and camp Lecter.”

Will fairly snorts.

“I’m afraid one is rather bigger than the other. You’re not very popular, did you know that?” Her eyes twinkle.

A wry smile spreads over his face. “I had some idea.”

“It would appear that the less interest you show in gossip, the more people want to share it with you, so, a fair amount has reached my ears. Most people think you’re an arrogant jerk who broke Dr. Lecter’s heart. There are a few, however, who admit he might have done something to deserve it. Did he?”

Will has a moment of cognitive dissonance in which it seems utterly absurd that he should be speaking so candidly to the person who, should she ever find out the nature of the beast, would have Hannibal locked up in a heartbeat. She’d be well above board about the whole thing, as well, ensuring he’d  _stay_  locked up forever. No part of him resents her for that truth, and yet, somehow, this doesn’t feel like betraying Hannibal.

“Will?”

Will puts aside the muddled feelings he has over his moral dilemma that isn’t really a dilemma, and settles for half the truth. “I need to be on my own.”

“For Sarah?”

His stomach plummets at the out-loud affirmation of Abigail’s existence. He stares dead-eyed over the top of Ardelia’s head. “Yeah.”

 

“I’m a guest of Mason Verger. He’s in need of a therapist.”

“How many other therapists are here tonight, courting him?”

Bedelia smirks. “Just me. Since you’re sitting this one out, I have very little in the way of competition.”

“ _Sitting this one out_ is an odd way to put it,” Hannibal remarks. “The  _termination of doctor-patient relationship_  is, I think, more appropriate.”

“Semantics,” she replies airily.

“I know you are always striving to improve your… accuracy.”

“From what I’ve gathered in our few brief sessions, the relationship was  _terminated_  by Mr. Verger, not you. That is rather atypical of your therapy.”

Hannibal’s smile hardens slightly at the challenge, but he simply says, “For whatever reason, Mason no longer felt his best interests were being considered.” He is distracted for a moment when he sees Will and Agent Mapp standing together at the edge of the crowd, talking, and clearly watching the two of them. A moment later, they take to the floor, clumsy, charming – and  _dangerous_ _._ “Take care, Dr. Du Maurier,” he advises, forcing his gaze back to her. “ _Once burned, twice shy_. Mason Verger will be keeping his eyes on you – and he has many sets.”

As the music crescendos and hits its final notes, Bedelia slides one leg forward and bends backwards gracefully over Hannibal’s arm. He leans over her in an unnecessarily dramatic finale.

“Belissima,” Hannibal says.

Bedelia replies, “Grazzi.”

 

The wall of well-wishers is thinning, and even the reporters disperse, fascinated by the food and hiding it behind the muttered explanations of  _collecting background footage_.

“Thinking of making an escape?” Ardelia asks, in the hushed tones of a conspirator.

She has caught Will eyeing the opening in the crowd. He could easily get through now, congratulate Margot and Judy, and leave. “Maybe,” he admits.

She shrugs and smiles and says, simply, “It’s nice that you came.”

Will can’t help but smile back a little bit. It didn’t sound so stupid when she said  _nice_.

“Agent Price was looking for you earlier.” She leads them off the dancefloor and towards the stairs.

“Oh?”

“I think he wanted to gossip. He had to make do with me.”

“I’m sure you’re a better conversationalist than me, and I’m damn sure he’s a better dance partner.”

She actually rolls her eyes. “Don’t leave on our account.”

Will manages another smile. “No. I’m just tired.” It’s the one excuse that’s never failed him, presumably because, as Abigail said, he always kind of looks it.

The sign announcing the union of Judith Olivia Ingram and Margo Elizabeth Verger is  _just_  too small for Margot to disappear behind. To Will, it seems she is trying awfully hard to anyway. Her smile is toothy and fixed, but, every thirty seconds or so, Judy takes Margot’s hand and squeezes it, Margot looks at her for a moment, and, when she turns back to the guests, her smile is genuine and her cheeks are pink. He witnesses this three times as he and Ardelia approach them, and it is such a lovely exchange, he hangs back for a split second so he can be sure the moment is safely preserved in his memory palace. It goes in a shadowy alcove near a window looking out at the stream by his house – tucked away not because it isn’t beautiful, but because it is somehow so  _so_  private, despite the fact that anyone could see it if they looked hard enough.

When the four of them are standing together, at last, and Will says, “Congratulations,” around the lump in his throat, he suddenly wonders if he’s ever hugged Judy and if it would be appropriate, or even  _expected_ , now.

Judy doesn’t allow the uncertainty to stand for long. She initiates a friendly handshake and says, “Thank you for being here,” before turning to Ardelia and requesting, somewhat business-like, “Mapp, can we talk?”

Ardelia looks neither concerned nor surprised when she nods and says, “Of course. Do you think they’ll let you leave the party?”

Judy laughs. “We’ll make it look very urgent. Put your FBI face on.” She is still holding Margot’s hand. “You and Will both look like you could use some fresh air. Or any air, really. Why don’t you go for a walk while the press have their heads in the champagne?”

Margot looks relieved. Judy looks back to Will. Her eyes are warm and her smile is wide, and it looks, he thinks, for some reason, like an apology.

 

In the hopeless tumult of his inner life, Will had forgotten that attending the Verger wedding would mean seeing Mason again. When he’d seen him in the front row, dressed in his finest but still confined to his chair, he’d thought that a ballroom away was about as close as he could ever stand being to the creature. As luck would have it, Mason wheels his way towards them as Will and Margot are pacing the second floor. They meet, appropriately, if unfortunately, in front of the eight-foot-tall Verger family portrait.

“My dear sister, all grown up and married.” His voice is loud, nasally, and exaggeratedly slow. He sounds something like an old-timey radio announcer, and had adopted a twang along with regaining the use of his tongue. “Is it time to give you your wedding present?”

The initial plosive in  _present_  is a challenge, and, for an absurd moment, Will wonders if it would have been any easier to say  _gift_. Then Mason kisses Margot’s hand with his mangled lips and strokes it tenderly with his own, bringing the bile right up into Will’s mouth and rendering him speechless.

Somehow not utterly repulsed, Margot just shakes her head and says loftily, “Mason, dear, you’re not very good at gifts.”

Mason pats her hand thoughtfully. “Surely, it’s the thought that counts.” The phrase is so rank with lost fricatives, it is hardly worth saying. “Besides… I haven’t always been the best brother to you, and you know I never cared for Judy. But she’s family now. I want us all to be a family…”

“The only gift from you Judy is interested in is a Verger baby.” Margot is blunt, and detached, and this seems to amuse Mason as much as her anger or grief.

“Maybe I’ve been cautious about helping with the ingredients,” Mason muses. “But it takes time to think about, Margot, dear. Parenthood. One could really screw up a child, you know.”

Margot narrows her eyes and laughs humourlessly. “Wondering if you could be good to a child? I’m surprised at you, Mason.”

“But it would be  _our_  baby, yours and mine. I could take parenting classes. I think it would bring us together. As a  _family_.”

“You keep saying that.” Margot is annoyed into taking her hand back, though it’s an obvious sign that he is getting to her.

Mason relishes it. He clasps her hand again and covers it with his other, the one missing a finger. It is limp and generally useless, and the stump where his little finger was severed is not what makes it revolting. “I know, I know.” His voice is equally repellant, a bastardization of soothing. “Five minutes and I wouldn’t even have to wrap it, in any sense.”

“And yet, Judy isn’t pregnant.”

“I thought you wanted your  _own_  baby, Margot.”

“Yes. And the last time I tried that, you removed my uterus.”

“To be fair, you weaponized your uterus. You shouldn’t have been waving it around like a loaded pistol.”

Margot is flushed, betraying her feelings, but she manages to keep her voice serene, and says, with a penitent bow of her head, “I brought it on myself.”

“As you so often do, Margot.” Mason pats her hand again. “I had to remove the temptation, didn’t I?”

She sighs. “Yes, Mason.”

“I had to take it all. Your uterus, your ovaries, your eggs…”

“Better safe than sorry.”

“A damn shame, and my biggest regret, taking away your ability to have a child. You should have just taken the chocolate, Margot.”

Margot isn’t able to voice another agreeable reply.

“Oh well,” he says airily. “Come along then. You can come too if you like, Mr. Graham.”

“What about Judy?” Margot asks, voice suddenly a cracked whisper.

“Judy will get her present soon enough.”

Margot clears her throat before speaking, to gain back a touch of the imperiousness that used to come so naturally. “Are you going to give us what you promised?”

“I’m going to give something _back_.” Mason swivels the chair around, still holding her hand.

She leans after him, but doesn’t move her feet until a split second later, and ends up stumbling towards him. Just before he’s out of reach, Margot’s hand shoots backwards to grab Will’s.

Will finds his voice and barks, “What is this about, Mason?”

Mason hardly spares him a glance. “I didn’t Humpty Dumpty her eggs,” he says, as though to someone very stupid. “I just found them a different basket.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by my beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr). She has redefined the term "beta-ing" to include providing indispensable insight, support, suggestions, critiques, and generally going above and beyond what would be expected of any editor. She is also my friend, partner, and roommate in the Hannibal Trash dumpster. I love this woman.
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	8. A Talent for Understatement (Or: Fuck Off, Hannibal)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What the FUCK, Mason?

Will hasn’t seen Mason’s personal chamber, so the Verger heir’s aptitude for set design, and his predilection for overwrought lighting is a new experience for him. Everything is angled just so – not set up like a room. Rather, set up like a stage. Here, a rocking chair. Here, a bookshelf crowded with stuffed toys and pop-up books. There, a heart monitor and ultrasound screen. Center stage: a three-sided crib, open at the front for the benefit of the audience. It might be his imagination, but he sees faint spotlights on each of the features, and a bright, garish one on the star of the show. The light falls about it – a perversion of heavenly radiance. The divine finger of God reaching down and pointing an accusatory finger at the main attraction: A dead pig with a little Verger stitched up inside it.

The question,  _Is it alive?_ might have been asked aloud, or not.

Someone comments on the lack of fetal heartbeat. It’s him. He says, “There’s no fetal heartbeat.”

The voice whispers,  _Get it out_. It could be coming from right beside him, or from miles away.

Someone says, “Margot...” Once again, belatedly, he realizes it’s himself.

Then, sharp nails dig into his arm, and she is pushing at him with her hands. “Get it out!” Margot, whose voice hardly ever rises above quiet disdain, is screaming at him.

He stumbles towards the cot. His hands are slick with blood, the sow’s middle unstrung and gaping open. The baby is in his arms, long gone. A new death brought into the world.

From the shadows by the door, Mason watches his sister’s breakdown gleefully. Box seats. When he grows bored of her tears, he backs his chair slowly and quietly into the hall. Barney is approaching from one end of it, and Judy from the other, drawn away from their respective searches by the shrill scream coming from within the playroom. “Clean up in there, Barney. And fetch Dr. du Maurier, would you?” Mason speeds off.

Inside, Margot is kneeling on the floor, dress all red down the front, face a mess of eyeliner, cradling something in Will’s tuxedo jacket. Barney gets to her first. She whimpers,  _no_ , when he gently tugs the dead infant out of her arms and covers it.

Her mouth is still open, but Will’s ears are ringing so violently, he can’t tell if she’s actually saying anything. Nor is he sure how much time passes during everything that happens next. In loud, throbbing silence, Barney takes the baby away. Margot faints, though she tracks Barney’s movement with her whole body, twisting in Judy’s arms before going limp. Then Judy takes Margot away, and Will is left alone.

 

As the afternoon turns into evening, the guests start wondering where the brides have disappeared to. Eventually, they all leave in confused huddles, shepherdless sheep. Even the media disperse when it becomes clear that there will be nothing more to the story than they’d already gathered. They take their fill of food. The musicians tire, and, eventually, retire. By six in the evening, there are only one or two town cars remaining. By seven, even Judy’s family have left.

 

One look at Will, slumped against the wall and bloody to the elbows, and at the eviscerated sow, lying in the sham of a large cradle, and Hannibal is able to deduce the entirety of the story. He approaches cautiously, and crouches before him. He has no intention of sitting on the floor, no matter how strong the urge to communicate with Will.

Will had ripped the buttons off of his sleeves in shoving them up in a hurry. The cuff hangs about his forearm roughly where the deepest cut is still healing beneath a bandage. The stiff corner drags in the slick of blood coating his skin, soaking up some of the horror to be a reminder as long as this shirt survives. Hannibal smells dry cleaning liquid and, beneath that, nothing. No scent of Will or his home to indicate it had hung in his closet long enough to be thus personalized. New? Certainly not. It must be a rental. He might as well have bought one for himself, Hannibal thinks in irritation. There would be no returning it now. For a moment, he wonders if Will’s parsimonious nature would force him to bleach the shirt and wear it until it wore out rather than throwing it away, or burning it, as most would. With an imagination like Will’s it, wouldn’t matter if the physical stain washed out.

In a display of his talent for understatement, Will whispers, “I was not prepared for that.”

“Would you like to talk about it?”

“I would like to forget about it.” Will regards his hands. “I would like to forget about a lot of things.” He takes a deep, shaky breath and gets to his feet.

Hannibal registers the utterly blank look on his face as he stands as well. “Come,” he says, and leads the way to a small bathroom. He stands in the doorway as Will washes up, alternately studying the back of Will’s head, and the reflection of Will’s face in the mirror. “Come home with me tonight.” 

Will shakes his head and keeps his face buried in a towel much longer than necessary to dry off. “I can’t be with you, Hannibal. I can hardly look at you.” 

“That is incredibly hurtful, Will.”

Will has the decency to blush. “You should probably leave me alone before I say anything else, then.”

“A terrible thing just happened, Will. It would be childish of me to leave you alone for the sake of my own feelings.” He approaches Will and grasps him gently by the shoulders. Will squirms out of his hold. 

“I don’t want to talk about it.” 

“Then we won’t talk about it. I’ll make dinner for us. We can sit in complete silence.”

“Soup for the soul?”

Hannibal smiles small. “Something like that.”

“I don’t think I can be grateful right now.”

“I’ll excuse your poor manners, just this once.” When Will refuses to respond, he asks, instead, “Why is your hand bandaged?”

“Burned myself in the lab.”

“May I see?”

“Don’t touch me,” Will snaps, though he sounds scared more than anything. He unwraps the bandage himself and holds his hand up for Hannibal to inspect.

Hannibal respects Will’s wishes, and looks, but doesn’t touch. However, he is far from finished pushing Will.

Hannibal tsks and shakes his head, expression disapproving, though he’s apparently decided it’s not that bad. Will wraps it up again. He is tired, suddenly, and sits down on the lid of the toilet.

Hannibal crouches before him once again, and places both hands on Will’s thighs, too close to the crotch not to be a sexual advance.

Will shakes his head in wonderment and irritation. “Christ, how are you  _always_  up for it?”

“In terms of ability or logistics?”

“Both.”

“I could walk you through my daily ablutions, but I think that would rather take the romance out of it.”

In spite of himself, Will snickers. “I wasn’t really asking, anyway.”

“Come home with me, Will,” Hannibal tries again. He squeezes Will’s thighs and repeats his name.

Half of Will wants to vomit, while the other half remembers what it was like to _want_ Hannibal’s hands on him. Perhaps fearing the latter half will win, Will snaps at him again. “Do you know what I see behind closed eyes now?”

“I imagine you see what I see.” Ignoring Will’s wrathful glare, Hannibal’s hands migrate up to rest on his waist, heels of his hands pressed firmly against each of Will’s hip bones. “Only, you fail to recognize the beauty in it.”

Will swallows. “It competes with everything. Even this. Even Abigail. Just… piles of discarded flesh, and a skinless body trying to lose consciousness.” He starts to shiver, and clenches his fists tight. The trembling comes out in his voice, instead, and that’s no better. “And you –  _smiling_. As calm as if you were peeling a fucking orange.”

“My heart rate never goes above eighty-five.” Hannibal tilts his head and reminds Will, “Your heart doesn’t race, either.”

Will is silent, on the fence about saying it aloud. He sighs and puts his face in his hands. Hannibal doesn’t withdraw at all, and Will can feel his breath on his cheek, searing his flesh. “It  _hurts_ , Hannibal.”

“Do you mean physically?”

Will nods.

“Tell me.”

“The water burns in the shower. It stings when I put my clothes on... I feel raw.” His voice sounds raw, too, and he wonders, momentarily, if he has always sounded that way. “It’s like, what you took from him, you took from me, too. I see myself bleeding out on the classroom floor, lecturing about you.”

“Surely not all the time.”

“Quality over quantity.” Will swallows, and adds on an almost inaudible confession. “It’s about as often as I can stand.”

“Are you in pain right now?”

Will drops his head lower and slides his fingers into his hair so he can grasp the roots and gain some transient relief. “What do you think?”

“I think you must be. You empathize with victims of murder when you feel victimized yourself.”

“I’m not the victim. Margot is. Our–”  _Our what? Our baby? Hardly. Unborn child? Does a coffin birth count?_ Will doesn’t continue. The well-oiled machinery of his fortress is bringing up the drawbridge, ready to lock this away. Lock it away along with all the rest of the horrors that, one day, when his mind starts deteriorating irreversibly, will get loose, swarm him, and kill him.

“Margot is a victim to be sure,” Hannibal says slowly, when he’s fairly confident Will does not mean to finish his sentence. “The two are not mutually exclusive.”

Will doesn’t respond, but brushes Hannibal’s hands off him and stands, returning to the sink to scrub, pointlessly, at a splash of blood on the cuff of his shirt.

Hannibal stands just behind him, looking again for signs of panic, but Will’s expression is like that which follows one of his reconstructions. He has somehow decided this tragedy isn’t his. Hannibal frowns deeply. “You have a very frustrating lack of focus sometimes, Will. Here is a tragedy that has directly befallen you, yet you deny it. You have every right to feel sorry for yourself in this moment. Instead, your self-pity resides with the parts of you that you have acquired. Second-hand pain with no truth beneath it.” Will doesn’t appear to be listening. Hannibal sighs. “If you are going to hurt, Will, let it be for the things that count.”

“You said my child didn’t count.”

Though spoken tonelessly, the words are a slap in the face for both of them. For Will, in remembering how Hannibal’s voice as he spoke them sent an icy finger sliding down his spine, filling him both with fear, and with cold fury. For Hannibal, in remembering saying them, and the ferocity with which he believed his own words.

“I’m sorry,” Hannibal says now. He swallows and confesses, “I feel jealousy keenly when it comes to you.”

“I know.” This disclosure isn’t news to Will. “It’s why, every day, you wake up and think it might have been better if you had killed Abigail.”

Hannibal stares at Will’s face in the mirror, drawing Will’s eyes up with the sheer force of his gaze to meet his own. “I do think that, at times.”

“You’ll always be looking for opportunities to make that right.” His voice is tight, and a muscle in his jaw twitches.

“Abigail is not a target. Nor is she a victim. If she was ever either, she isn’t anymore.”

Will doesn’t acknowledge the statement. He is quite clearly angry now. He drops his head for a moment and closes his eyes. They are still closed when he says, voice surprisingly quiet, “When I was in there with Margot, I thought,  _This is the worst thing that has ever happened_.” He opens his eyes and, tired of seeing his countenance behind him in the mirror, turns to face Hannibal squarely. “It  _should_  be, Hannibal,” he continues, and Hannibal is no longer sure if the tight jaw and flashing eyes are indicative of fury or anguish. “But as soon as she was gone, I was reminded that, somehow, what  _you_  did is worse. I can’t even properly think about what I just saw, because it keeps getting eclipsed by what I saw before.”

“I’ve said it before: you learned your limitations too early.”

“I don’t want be capable of that.”

“Your capabilities are preordained, Will. Your choice is whether or not to access them.”

Will is quiet. Hannibal places a hand on his cheek. Will shudders and looks ready to cry. 

“You’re worried you will.”

“Fuck off, Hannibal.”

Hannibal lowers his hand to keep from striking him. “Will–” 

Will cuts him off forcefully, turning away. “I need some  _GOD DAMN TIME_.”

Eventually, Hannibal nods in acceptance. “There is a fine line between ensuring a friend is alright, and ensuring that friend will get worse. I’ll leave you alone, Will. Please don’t do anything stupid.”

“I’m fine,” Will says, quiet once more. He is studying his hands again, and scrapes at what might be dried blood caught between nail bed and cuticle, or might be totally imagined. “I’m fine.”

 

Bedelia du Maurier’s suite is lavish, and currently only lamp-lit. The oil is low in the lamps, and they flicker even in the absence of any draft. Hannibal draws a bath, placing a hand on the edge of the large bronze tub, claw-footed and deep. He is calculating something.

“What do you have against Margot, Bedelia?”

Bedelia turns only her head to face him, a bemused eyebrow raised. “Nothing at all. Would you?”

He unzips her dress slowly, dragging his knuckles down her spine. He points out, “You’ve been familiarizing yourself with execution.”

“It’s a heady feeling,” she agrees, stepping into the bath.

“I’m somewhat hurt you couldn’t find better models. Is it safe to assume you wanted to be strangling  _me_?”

“Hell hath no wrath...”

“For a while, I thought you might be courting me, Bedelia. What an absurd notion.”

Her smirk neither affirms nor refutes the statement.

Hannibal continues. “I’m not sure where you were going with the symbolism. Are you suggesting I trapped you in a similar way?”

“You do make it difficult to breathe.”

“In fact, I have a catalogue of moves designed to obstruct, crush, or otherwise disable airways.”

“Why do you love to make people gasp?”

“I don’t. Not any more than I care to make them do other things.”

“Does it make you feel more like you can give or take a life?”

“I  _can_ ,” Hannibal replies simply. “I never suffered the self-doubt you do, Bedelia.”

Bedelia is quiet for a long while. “You’re a man of patterns, Hannibal. Ever since Mischa. The handmaiden, the trainee, the girl, me… We were all here before Will Graham, and yet, all we’ve done is pave the way for him.”

The lamps give a warning flicker, threatening extinguishment. Hannibal’s tone is too casual for his words. “Are you suggesting some sort of deep-rooted misogyny on my part?”

“I wouldn’t dare.”

Hannibal takes his time removing his jacket, and drapes it over the back of the chair at an ornate dressing table. “This cruel joke of yours was not about the Vergers, was it?”

“No.” Bedelia leans back, basking in the warmth of the water, and closes her eyes. “I feel alive at the very thought of injuring Will Graham.” She slides down in the bath until her hair is submerged. When she sits up and leans back once more, Hannibal’s fingers weave their way into her hair and massage expensive aromatic shampoo against her scalp. She sighs contentedly. “And why not? I gave you an opportunity to comfort him. To show him there are forces of evil other than you.” She wrings her hair out over her shoulder and tilts her head back as Hannibal’s hands migrate down her neck. He could snap it so easily. His hands don’t stop there, though, and, as they move on, she adds, with a small curve of a smile, “You’re welcome.”

Hannibal cups one of her breasts, rubbing a thumb over the nipple. With his other hand, he traces a finger in a straight line from her sternum to her navel – just where he might cut her. His lips are against her ear. “I advise you not to be so smug, Bedelia. I’ll admit, the arrogance suits you, but you may find your participation getting noticed.”

“He spurned your advances, yet you’re not angry with _him_.” Some bitterness seeps its way into her voice.

“I have some idea what he is going through.”

“You must.”

“Meaning?”

“You don’t possess the capacity for empathy as Will Graham experiences it. You couldn’t possibly feel for him without having felt that same feeling before.”

Hannibal’s hands pause in their application of conditioner and he leans down. Bedelia tenses for a moment, and shivers when he kisses her neck. His lips linger there for a second or two before he raises his head and whispers in her ear once more. “Is that so?” He can hear her heart racing, and thinks to stop it, but, she has only just begun to play, and it would be a shame not to give her the chance to show him what she is capable of.

“When will your fascination turn to frustration?” Bedelia presses.

“Will Graham will always possess the capacity to become more. That potential is something I will never tire of.”

“The potential for madness… You collect disasters.”

“Yes,” he says, pressing down gently on her shoulders until her hair is submerged. Her heartbeat quickens further. It would be so easy to hold her under. Disastrous for her, and  _too_  easy for him. The fact that Bedelia knows this, allowing her to dance with the devil a bit more passionately, makes her much more interesting – for the time being.

“Is he to be another church, built to collapse under the care of an indifferent God? Will you turn his heart into the worshipping congregation, only to turn away when it is crying for help beneath the rubble? Do you think you can rescue him from his own crumbling existence?”

Hannibal doesn’t answer. He stands and removes the rest of his clothes, and, as he slides into the water, the lamps flicker out altogether.

In the darkness, there is only the sound of wet skin slipping against wet skin, the slosh of limbs displacing water, and low, heavy breaths.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My beautiful murderwife, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), is currently busy working on her Master's (like a badass), preparing to give a talk at her university (like a badass), and just generally being awesome and a badass. She has still given me her necessary-to-my-existence feedback on this chapter, because she is hella devoted to Hannigram and Murder Family, but the probably numerous grammatical errors are entirely my own. Also, in case you're new to the internet, I love Kate. Like, a LOT. Confirmed for gay.
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	9. Survivors: Part II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part two of Margot's backstory, and some more Margot-Judy history.
> 
> Again, I’m putting this in a separate chapter because, as you may have guessed by the title of this chapter, and by the general vibe of this fic, the material is quite sensitive. If any of the following triggers apply to you, please skip this chapter. You’ll be able to continue the story without it. There is also a synopsis in the end notes.
> 
> Trigger Warnings: physical & psychological child abuse; child-on-child sexual abuse; extreme homophobia; systematic emotional manipulation; PTSD; mention of systematic rape & child pornography.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the lovely wormsin ([wormsin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormsin/pseuds/wormsin) on A03, and [@wormsin](https://wormsin.tumblr.com) on tumblr). They have been so helpful and supportive editing these next chapters and I cannot thank them enough. They are also insanely talented in both the visual art department (check out their tumblr!) and the writing department (check out their amazing and sexy Hannigram fic, ["A Mirror in the Dark"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10728969)!).
> 
> Continued thanks to my partner, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), the best murderwife in the universe, and the love of my life. <3
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)   
>  [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)

Margot and Mason were still children, miles away from puberty, the first time he molested her. Mother and Papa had been silent with her for two weeks – a very long time for a child. She didn’t know why they were angry with her. She didn’t know that it was what Mason said on Valentine’s Day;  _Margo’s a dyke_ didn’t seem like a terrible thing to say, as far as Mason’s insults went. In amongst the general antagonism usually present at the dinner table – Mason kicking Margot under the table, Mother telling Mason to chew with his mouth closed, Papa throwing veiled insults at Mother, the kind Margot wouldn’t be able to interpret for fifteen or so years – in amongst all that, it was impossible for eight-year-old Margot to know it was Mason’s fault she was being shunned by her parents.

She was somewhat shunned at school, as well. Only a handful of girls had drivers, and they all stuck together. Margot was one of them, for a while, until the head girl invited her to a sleepover. Margot asked what they would do, and the girl said,  _watch movies and gossip_ _,_ and Margot said,  _sounds boring_ , and that was that. She alienated the rest of her class when the teacher asked them each to talk about their weekends, and Margot said she’d spent it riding, and exploring their estate.

The girl to whom Margot gave the Valentine was always friendly to her, but, when Margot asked if she wanted to come over and see the horses, she blushed and said she wasn’t allowed. She avoided Margot after that, and, though she smiled at her during unavoidable interactions, it always seemed to Margot that she was afraid.

Mason was her best and only friend. The only one who ever spent any time with her. They went riding together, played checkers. Checkers was painful. Every time she lost a piece, she had to rest her fists on the table while Mason whipped the weighted disk at her knuckles. Chess was okay, but sometimes Margot would go to move one of her pieces, and Mason would grab her wrist tight and bend it, until she put it back where it was and chose another one. Mason had learned to tut at some point, and it was one of his favourite things to do.  _Tut tut, Margot, not that one_.

Really, Mason was enthusiastic in his study of what makes and breaks people from the very beginning. Perhaps it was because they were twins, and spent so much time together, but, somehow Mason’s aptitude for the psychological was doubly intense when it came to Margot. Two weeks after Valentine’s day, Mason found her crying in a staircase, and said,  _Hush, now. I want to show you something_.

That night at dinner, Mason said something rude to Mother, and winked conspiratorially at Margot. He didn’t kick her for the entire meal. Bewildered, Margot gave him a small smile, and squeezed her knees together under the table.

 

Margot missed a lot of school. There were times Mason was so rough with her, she couldn’t sit down for days, and had to pretend to be ill so she wouldn’t have to go to class. Instead, she’d lie at home in her school uniform, minus underwear, doing math problems while lying on her stomach with her legs slightly spread. Math was the one subject she never fell behind in.

Mason was very specific about the kind of degradation he subjected Margot to. He never came on her face, or called her a slut, or cut her anywhere that couldn’t be covered up easily – but not out of respect, or any other kind of decency. Only to instill, with tragic success, a bizarre sort of gratitude in her. To say he was better than the people in the videos he showed her, and didn’t he treat her well? His abuse was somehow elevated in his mind. He said he cared about her, and did the things he did for her own good, and, for a long time, Margot believed him.

The times that it actually felt good were worse, and it took years for Margot to figure out why. Mason often went to the trouble, no doubt getting a sick pleasure from seeing the surprise on her face before she learned the art of impassivity. The first time she had an orgasm, it was painful, and she didn’t know what was happening. In hindsight, she wishes she’d remained ignorant.

The first time Mason tore her, Margot screamed. She screamed so loud, he slapped her and took it out. But it wasn’t over. He just slicked himself up more, and said her ass felt better anyway.

“Be quiet now, Margot. Or I’ll tell Papa you were looking at nudes of girls and touching yourself.” She pressed her lips together, trying to quiet her sobs. She could hardly see; the tears were coming so fast. Mason stroked her hair. “There’s a good girl.”

Margot came to realize over the years what an exceptional tactic that had been. She was so afraid of what Papa would do, she’d never even called Mason’s bluff. Mason was so sadistic, Margot had to believe their father could only be worse. She became convinced that, next time, Papa wouldn’t just stand by and watch. He’d participate, with the unspoken acceptance of Mother, who would find other places to be that day.

 

Margot’s relationship with her mother was a strange one. Mother never said what she hoped Margot could be saved from. The _L-word_ was never spoken, only alluded to, with the kind of subtle disapproval a child couldn’t be expected to understand. This meant years of biting down on pillows, not knowing why she was being punished. Mother was removed in a different way than Molson, who had no scruples about intimidation and threats. When she was still very young, but old enough to know that other girls had moms who were their “best friends,” she wanted to ask her mother if it was normal what Mason was doing. When she was a little older, she stopped caring about _normal_ , and just wanted to ask if she was going to be okay, and would her vagina ever heal. When she graduated high school, she might have asked what she could expect out of college, but she didn’t. Even that seemed like fishing for too much advice.

The first sexual experience Margot had, outside of Mason’s sphere of influence, was in high school, where she messed around with a boy from the neighbouring private school. It felt good, from a strictly sexual standpoint, but, no better than when she fingered herself – something Mason would have her do while he, himself, masturbated to whatever depraved pornography he was currently into. More than anything, Margot found that, having a boyfriend, she did better in school. There was someone to bring her assignments, and help her with homework when she was absent. He was useful. Her heart didn’t flutter at the sight of him; she didn’t want to hold or be held by him afterwards; she had no desire to spend any time or effort making him happy. It would be years before Margot discovered that those feelings she had for her classmate, nine Valentine’s days ago, could be accompanied by the desire to touch and be touched.

At this point, it had also been years since Mason fucked her. Margot was far too old for his tastes now, with her height and her curves and her pubic hair. He seemed to enjoy cutting her as much as he had enjoyed raping her, however, and showed equal, if not greater enthusiasm in discovering how much she could take.

From time to time, she’d prolong Mason’s sadistic refractory period by sneaking into the first aid station and taking extra bandages, to keep the wounds covered even after they’d healed. If Mason got suspicious, she’d pick off the scabs so they would bleed again. There was a fine line, Mason said, between sticking her, and testing the thickness of her skin. He said it with the same authority as a parent asserting,  _You’ll thank me one day_. Sometimes, she could manipulate that line. It was similar to how she used to fake a limp, days after Mason raped her. But there was never the promise of sympathy, or mercy. She was just borrowing time.

 

Only when Margot went away to university did she have enough distance to figure out what was her, what was Mason and his madness, and what was her fear of Molson and his. She went through a period of being ruinously angry with her family, feeling brainwashed, abused, robbed of normalcy. And then she went through a period of denying that her past had anything to do with her, and spent the next two years as a somewhat reclusive, but defiantly normal student. She engaged with men and with women, and felt nothing for any of them. In a way, she was relieved by this – not discovering herself to be definitively homosexual. The relief was quickly followed by renewed anger and self-loathing, as it meant she clearly hadn’t left her family’s values behind. It was still several years before she’d even meet Judy.

When Margot went home again, after Mother died, Mason found her repulsive, and so she felt repulsive. She became obsessed with creating an inscrutable exterior, building on her good looks with armour of fashionable clothes, expensive jewelry, dark eye makeup, and bright lipstick. Given the time she spent on her appearance, people understandably believed her to be vain. She did nothing to dispel those thoughts. Better vanity than victimhood. She came from one of the wealthiest families in the country; entitlement and snobbery were to be expected. She could maintain that.

Most of her fellow graduate students ended up thinking Margot was aloof, and selfish. She didn’t care enough to prove otherwise. She continued to experiment with her sexuality from within the safety of her arrogant, dismissive, external self, with both men and women, in a wide range of ages. However, sex was not a mutual endeavour. They would kiss and neck and feel each other up, and that’s as far as Margot would allow them to go in terms of touching her. Then, she’d eat them out, or suck them off, and try to convince herself that she was enjoying any of it.

As it turned out, her brain was tricking her in more ways than one. In her attempt at random sampling, Margot had ignored anyone she might have some _actual_ interest in, in favour of lustless sexual experiences that left her wanting nothing to do with the world, or anyone in it. One woman, however, would not be ignored.

The first time Margot fell in love, it happened so slowly, she didn’t notice in time to stop herself. She just one day became aware that she was fantasizing about a happy life with someone, and that her knees wanted to give way beneath her any time they were in the same room together. When they became intimate, it was the most pleasurable experience Margot had ever had, and she wanted to kiss her all the time. On the occasions when they fought, Margot actually cared, and found that she wanted to make things better. She wanted to talk with her, be with her, spend hours at a time in her company. She thought, one day, she might even let her see Margot fully naked, scars and all. When they broke up, Margot missed her.

Only when she met Judy did Margot realize how superficial their relationship had really been. The woman had been dating a Margot that had only existed for the past three years.

 

Margot’s first suicide attempt bore no logical correlation to the events in her life. Things were getting better. She’d been accepted into her first choice of doctorate program; she’d recently become intimate with Judy; Judy was going to come to Maryland, and they were going to move in together. Margot went swimming in the Susquehanna River, in her favourite pool, and it felt like being washed clean of her old life. And then, before she knew it, she found herself fully submerged, looking up through the water at the sky – bluer than it had ever been – and having no desire to come up for air. Her body betrayed her, though. As soon as she inhaled, her panicked limbs took her back to shore, where she lay, coughing and alone, looking up at a sky that didn’t seem so blue anymore.

Not long after she and Judy started living together, happier than she’d ever been in her life, Margot tried again. In the bath, with a glass of red wine, after a beautiful home-cooked meal and some lively fooling around in their new bed, it occurred to Margot that if she simply slit open an artery, she wouldn’t have to worry about her body’s intrinsic survival mechanisms. It was a fleeting thought, so brief and out of place in her current feelings of, not only being cherished and cared for, but of being totally in love. She might not have acted on it, had she not been so relaxed that the wine glass slipped out of her hand, cracking cleanly into several sharp opportunities. When Judy came in to brush her teeth, she found Margot, about to fall unconscious, a shard of glass wedged in her upper inner thigh.

While waiting for the ambulance, wrapped up in both a towel and Judy’s arms, Margot sobbed that she was sorry, and she didn’t know what came over her. She was happy, she promised, and she loved Judy. Only her heart hammering against Margot’s shoulder as she held her gave away how frightened Judy was. Her voice was soft and calm when she said, “I know you love me. And I know you’re happy. It snuck up on you, didn’t it?” Margot could only nod. Judy pressed her forehead against Margot’s and whispered, “We won’t let it do that again.” And they didn’t.

It wasn’t easy, despite there being months at a time that were simply golden. Judy was fiercely protective of Margot, often unnecessarily so, but, more often, with good reason. Mason continued to exert his influence despite the fact that Margot had, once again, removed herself from Muskrat Farm. The offer from her university was swiftly and neatly revoked, and, mysteriously, all her back up schools misplaced her applications.

 

In spite of this, there was a lull in the drama, as Mason left the country soon after. Judy’s job was tedious and burdensome, but she wasn’t making any new enemies, and it meant she could spend as much time as she wanted with Margot, building their lives and keeping her safe. Then, about a year into their new living arrangement, Judy introduced Margot to her family. Papa died; Mason came home; but it was really Judy’s ostensibly perfect home life that almost drove Margot away. It was so incalculably uncalculated. It took them a long time to return to the flawless understanding they’d achieved during their semi-annual Chicago visits.

Margot and Judy got good at rebuilding. Despite the various impediments to their happiness, there was never any point in time at which they were not completely devoted to one another. Even with Mason’s return, and the shadow this cast over their future, there were times that they were almost blissfully happy.

Then, tragedy struck the European branch of the Ingram family. Subsequently, Judy went to Austria and Denmark for several months, begging Margot every few days to come and join her. Margot, however, moved back to Muskrat Farm.

When Mason broke Margot’s arm, Judy flew home the next day. She only returned to her family overseas once she saw that Margot was receiving the best medical care possible, and had an appointment booked with the most highly-recommended psychiatrist in the South Atlantic States. Later, Margot admitted to Judy that she’d made an attempt on someone’s life _other_ than her own, and her broken arm was the result of Mason not _taking kindly to it_. Margot forestalled Judy’s jumping on another plane by assuring her that her new therapist was helping her deal with Mason.

When their plans to emancipate themselves from Mason went entirely awry, they somehow survived that, as well.

They can overcome _this_. Margot _can_ overcome this, as long as she has Judy.

She thinks it, but doesn’t feel it. What she does feel, is that she and Judy spend a lot of time rebuilding, and, despite their best efforts, the structure is never quite sound.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Synopsis:
> 
> Margot attempted suicide twice. The second time, Judy found her. A few years later, Judy went to Europe to deal with an undisclosed family emergency, during which time Mason convinced Margot to move back to Muskrat Farm. After an undisclosed final straw, Margot attempted fratricide instead of suicide, failed, and got her arm broken in the process. Judy flew home immediately, and only left again once Margot's arm started healing and she had an appointment with the best psychiatrist in town. Guess who that is.


	10. No Adequate Armour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Margot, while still managing to blame herself some crazy how, reflects on how Mason is a piece of shit and always has been.

_**It was a mistake to go to Mason without a fully-formed plan and impenetrable emotional armour. Margot had neither that day, and, on top of that, Judy was mad at her. It was the worst day to visit that wing of the house, past the playroom and its din of memories. She was asking for it.** _

_**Dr. du Maurier was perched at the end of Mason’s bed and coolly glanced over her shoulder as Margot entered the chamber. Margot didn’t look at her as she approached the bed and stood at the foot of it with her arms folded. Dr. du Maurier rose smoothly, opined, “Therapy can require a measure of creativity, Mr. Verger,” and glided out the door.** _

_**“You seem tense, Margot.”** _

_**“You seem lost, Mason. Didn’t think you’d be so quick to trust a psychiatrist again.”** _

_**“Well, you’re getting married, Sis… I need**_ **someone**   _ **to tend to my emotional wellbeing.”**_

_**“You were the one who told me you can only rely on family.”** _

_**“Not friends, not therapists, not Will Graham…”** _

_**“Maybe you were right.”** _

_**“Blood family, Margot. Wives don’t count either.”** _

 

Now, her wife is peeling off the wedding dress and running her a bath, and, as Margot watches Judy’s hands wash the blood from her own, it seems ludicrous that anything else should be referred to as blood family. She hears herself laughing, and then, as though from far away, hears her laughter disintegrate into tears. When the tears don’t stop, Judy wraps her in a towel and brings her to bed, pulling the covers up around them both and holding her close. While Margot cries until her stomach hurts, Judy whispers,  _I’m so sorry, baby_ , over and over. She unpins Margot’s hair one curl at a time and kisses her temple after setting each pin down on the bedside table. Margot drifts off into exhausted sleep only to awake an hour later to a visceral pain in her chest where she’d dreamt Dr. Lecter plunged his hand in, twisted her heart right out of her and handed it to Mason for consumption. Judy is still awake, and tries to still her, turning up the heat when Margot can’t stop shaking. Once or twice, Margot hears her whisper,  _Don’t leave me, okay, Em?_

 

_**“Should I give Dr. Lecter advanced warning this time?”** _

_**Mason’s eyebrows danced, his forehead being the only part of his face now capable of expression. “Do you want to?”** _

_**“Not really. What are you up to, Mason?”** _

_**“Oh, nothing as sinister as you imagine. I only want to understand Dr. Lecter in order to better understand myself.”** _

_**“Well… that’s a lie.”** _

_**Mason ignored her. “I thank God for what happened. It was my salvation. I’m right with the Risen Jesus and it’s all okay now.”** _

_**“All okay,” Margot repeated softly.** _

_**“Margot, dear, are you still angry with me?”** _

_**She smiled a hard smile. “How could I stay mad at that face?” She felt the tiniest amount of vindictive pleasure when Mason reached to reassemble his mask, a tinge of pink in his mangled cheeks.** _ **Small victories.**

_**When the porcelain was in place, Mason held out his hand. “Come here, Margot. What did you really come to talk about?” When she didn’t take his hand, he patted the bedspread beside him, instead.** _

_**Margot opted not to sit. She went to the small fridge and poured herself some water. Her bright red lipstick left a stain on the glass and, when she wiped at it with her thumb, it smeared familiarly, like blood. “I thought you might like to know where things stand with the Lecter family.”** _

_**“That’s thoughtful of you, Sis. I’ll miss having you in my pocket.”** _

 

On day two, Margot wakes up early. The phone is ringing. The room is warm and the bed is cozy. She can almost pretend they are back in their little house, sleeping in and ignoring the outside world. Back before Judy went away, and Margot moved back to Muskrat Farm. The phone continues to ring. Margot burrows under the covers, feeling a fresh wave of sadness, and the beginning of more uncontrollable sobs.

Judy is at the window now, somehow, the phone to her ear. The warmth in the room has nothing to do with the weather; the sky outside has never looked more determinedly grey. She flinches when hail starts pelting the glass. The gas fire at the foot of the bed, together with the cloud-filtered sun, fills the room with a forced, uncomfortable light. She feels as though she is seeing everything from behind a thick glass wall. Judy is wearing a wisp of a shirt, and, through it, Margot can see her scar. It is practically a mirror image of Will’s. She doesn’t feel bad about Will’s scar – not that one, anyway – Judy, though, had never done anything to deserve this.

Judy turns when she feels Margot’s eyes on her. She crosses the room, and she might as well be dragging the dead pig, it takes so long in Margot’s mind. When Judy fits herself around Margot once more, Margot feels her arms as though through a layer of glass, too.

 

_**“Go on, Margot, dear. I’m all ears. They’ve just been redistributed.”** _

_**“The Hobbs girl has run away, and Will Graham, it seems, has decided he wants nothing to do with him. Dr. Lecter is quite alone.”** _

_**Mason’s eyes shone hungrily above the mask.** _

_**“Your friends from Italy – yes, I know, Mason – they’ve been paid. Whatever it is you’re planning, better buy some cops, too.”** _

_**“It does complicate things that he’s still a well-respected and ostensibly law-abiding citizen.”** _

_**“I’ve met your new henchmen. They don’t seem the types to be stymied by** _ _**complicated. All you need to concern yourself with, now, is what’ll happen when Dr. Lecter is in your hands.”** _

_**“In Cordell’s hands, Margot,” Mason corrects her. “** _ _**My contact with the good doctor will be from fork to mouth.”** _

_**“Dinner.”** _

_**“And a show, I think.”** _

_**“Be careful, Mason. Remember how the last show ended.”** _

_**There is a moment of silence in which Margot is sure Mason is leering behind his mask.** _

_**“Ended?”** _

 

It is difficult to place where, exactly, the surrogate fits on the spectrum of Mason’s abuse. The physical and psychological had always been inextricably linked in his games. Margot tries to figure out, empirically, if this is any worse than past violations – or, if she’s paralyzed as she is because there is simply no room left in her to deal with this one. As always, she has the inescapable feeling that she’d brought this on herself.

 

_**“Does Cordell know he’s been demoted from physician to cook?”** _

_**“He doesn’t view it as a demotion. My table is about to become a temple, and Cordell, the high priest.”** _

_**“Versatile in both profession and loyalties.”** _

_**“And morals. Don’t forget morals.”** _

_**“You are a vocation unto yourself, Mason.”** _

_**“And I’m lucky to have a devoted follower.”** _

_**“Don’t mistake gleeful amorality for devotion.”** _

_**“You’re right, of course, Margot. But I’m finding his amorality to be a valuable tool. Did you know Cordell was in cryogenics before he was in paediatrics?”** _

_**“What did he do to get fired from** _ _**that job?”** _

_**“He helped someone in need, Margot. I’m trying to tell you he’s here to help us. I want us to be a family, again, you and me.”** _

_**“And Judy?”** _

_**“Where is your ambition, Margot? She’s dull. What is she for, if you’re not going to put a Verger baby in her?”** _

_**“We want a Verger baby. You’re the one being… withholding.”** _

_**“Well, she hasn’t tried very hard, has she? I’m sure she could get what she wants if she came and sat on Santa’s lap.”** _

_**“You seem a little tense yourself, Mason. How long has it been? Can you even get it up anymore, or does Cordell do that for you, too?”** _

_**“That mouth of yours… always worked well.”** _

_**“If I was good, it was over faster.”** _

_**“Oh, Margot, you know that’s not true…”** _

 

Margot calculates what she believes might be the appropriate amount of grieving time, and aims to limit herself to that. When the grief once again refuses to dissipate according to her projections, she despairs of it lessening at all. She retreats into herself, and into the abstract, where things make sense. Her physical body spends most of its time at the window seat, where she often chose to do her scripting, even before things fell apart. Papers litter the sill – some half-finished coding, some complex equations under the headings of Millennium Prize problems, and derivations and integrations that have no purpose other than to fill time idly with numbers.

 

_**“I used to wonder if she was sticking around just to stick it to me… after getting stuck. I never paid Carlo for that. Not a job well done.”** _

_**“Well, you don’t have to come to the wedding.”** _

_**“What would people think? So edgy, today, Margot. Is Judy neglecting her basic carnal duties?”** _

_**“We’re busy. Saving your empire.”** _

_**“Yes, Judy has been very busy. Wagging her finger at my employees, wagging her tongue at my investors… Maybe if she weren’t so busy, she could wag them where it matters.”** _

 

Judy tries in vain to keep Margot from deteriorating all at once. She feeds her porridge, and soup, and blows on her tea until it’s the perfect temperature to sip at. Things they used to do for each other when they were sick, and trying to feel less miserable by being cute. It’s just Margot that’s sick, now. Judy can’t share this with her.

 

_**“When I impulsively lash out, on the whole, I don’t lash out randomly. I throw a very specific sort of fit.”** _

_**“You’re nothing if not specific. Land the plane, Mason.”** _

_**“You’ve always worked so hard to give me what I want. It’s only fair to talk about what Margot wants.”** _

_**“You know what I want.”** _

_**“First you need to prepare yourself. Psychologically. This could be a very emotional experience for you. I have to think about the appropriate timing.”** _

_**“Don’t think too long, Smiley.”** _

_**“That’s the spirit, Margot. You’re boring when you’re sad, and mopey tears don’t taste so good.”** _

 

Sometimes, Will is here, looking as wrecked as Margot feels. Klinsy is here, too. She thinks, remotely, that she must be in bad shape if the dog is allowed in their suite. His fur is soft and warm against her cold fingers, but petting him isn’t enough to take her mind off Mason. She stops eating altogether. For a while, she folds origami, but her hands shake badly after two days with no food, and she stops that, too.

Judy is never gone longer than five minutes at a time, but, to Margot, with her reawakened instinct to end her own life clinging to her, it sometimes feels like hours have passed. She can feel herself wasting away. Getting married hadn’t fixed anything, and the concept that it might have mocks her from a time already long past. If she had any energy, she’d be angry at the universe for making her life with Judy into a mathematical model of the laws of disorder. It seems almost sentient in its determination to remind her, time and time again, that things can always get worse, and will.

But Judy is here with her, still. The ornate table, where they took late breakfasts on lazy days during happier times, now serves as Judy’s desk. Judy sleeps with her, wrapped all around her and holding her tightly. Even when the sheets get damp with sweat and the pillows damp with tears. Even when Margot’s starved body makes her breath reek of stomach acid, and her hair becomes greasy and matted. Margot is slipping into a quiet kind of madness, and nothing she and Judy had ever done can stop it now.

Maybe that’s all marriage meant: a promise to stay through it all anyway.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the lovely wormsin ([wormsin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormsin/pseuds/wormsin) on A03, and [@wormsin](https://wormsin.tumblr.com) on tumblr). They have been so helpful and supportive editing these next chapters and I cannot thank them enough. They are also insanely talented in both the visual art department (check out their tumblr!) and the writing department (check out their amazing and sexy Hannigram fic, ["A Mirror in the Dark"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10728969)!).
> 
> Continued thanks to my partner, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), the best murderwife in the universe, and the love of my life. <3
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	11. Crazy Sons of Bitches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pig-baby has kind of fucked with everyone a little bit. Judy gives Barney what-for and also tries to talk a modicum of sense into Will. It probably doesn't work.

Barney looks smaller in a suit. Feels smaller in a suit. Cordell, who had not attended the wedding, looms in comparison, with his off-white whites stretched tight over his capacious belly. The fact that he looks like a grotesque, overgrown baby only serves to make his ever-present blithe smile more sinister. Cordell is a roly-poly mass of evil, and he gives Barney the creeps.

Mason will likely lie low for the next few days, despite knowing Judy won’t leave Margot’s side. That means Cordell will be lurking mainly in Mason’s wing of the house, as well. They are probably already planning his next practical joke.

Barney keeps their exchange to a minimum, and excuses himself from Mason’s chamber as quickly as possible. “Awful lot of clean-up to do,” he mutters, barely suppressing a shudder as he passes Cordell – a vast expanse of scrubs, topped by a leering face.

Instead of making his way back to the playroom, though, he feels tugged towards Margot and Judy’s suite. Knowing exactly how welcome he’ll be, he heaves a big sigh before knocking. Knowing, an instant later, that there is nothing he can do, he retreats before anyone answers.

 

Margot feels things the way she believes them: so superficially it’s not worth mentioning, or, to her very foundations. Emotional lability has been a signature part of Margot’s character as long as Judy has known her. It’s part of who Margot is, and she loves Margot for it, and Margot loves her for loving her for it. Margot’s good moods made her vibrant, and her bad ones, though they would incapacitate her sometimes for hours, always tapered off on their own. Judy tells herself it’s no worse than before – that Margot has been this far gone and come back – but, in her heart, she fears that, this time, Mason might have succeeded in breaking her.

“How  _could_  he?” Margot sobs.

“I don’t know,” Judy answers helplessly. “I didn’t think he could torture you any more…” She holds Margot close, making a mess of the designer vest, and rubs her back while she fails to think of anything else to say.

Margot’s sobs grow quiet, and Judy thinks she may have fallen asleep, but then the tears start up again in a fresh wave of anguish. This happens again, and again, and, even in sleep, Margot clings to her.

 

Early, very early in the morning, Margot’s phone rings. It is barely light out. The caller ID says Will Graham. Margot doesn’t even glance at it, though her eyes are open, and Judy puts it on silent. The display lights up a couple more times as Will keeps trying. Then, the house phone rings. It rings and rings, and neither of them makes a move to answer it. Finally, Judy’s phone rings. She regards it for a moment, then picks up.

“Hi, Will.”

“I’m sorry I froze.”

“I don’t blame you.”

“Tell me Margot’s okay.”

“Margot’s okay.”

A deep inhale on Will’s end, but no words.

“Are you still there?”

“Yeah.”

Judy hears a door close on the other end of the line, and the particular way it latches shut is familiar. A few moments later, faint whinnying and the stomping of hooves on beds of hay confirm the connection for her. “Are you still _here_?”

“Yeah.”

Judy sighs. “Come up.” She gives succinct directions to their suite before hanging up and paging Barney.

Margot has cried herself back to sleep. Judy tucks the covers around her snugly, and smooths her hair back from her face. She brushes away the strands that have stuck to the tears on her cheeks, and slides down the bed so she’s lying with her nose almost touching Margot’s. Still, Margot has never felt farther away. “Don’t leave me, okay Em?” she whispers, and holds her tighter as she waits for a knock at the door.

 

“If no one answered, were you just going to–”

“Roam the house until I found you? I might have,” Will admits.

“Are you okay?”

“Mhm.”

Barney arrives then, and Judy addresses him curtly. “Mr. Matthews, set up a guest room and find Mr. Graham some clothes.” She doesn’t say _please_ , and dismisses him without sparing him another glance.

She was right in thinking that seeing Barney would make her angry. He is responsible for this, at least in part, and the fact that she doesn’t know exactly what his role was, doesn’t make her want to scream at him any less. Her face is still flushed when she turns back to Will, though her tone is even enough. “Margot is asleep.”

Will nods, then shakes his head and mutters, “I don’t know why I’m still here.”

“You shouldn’t be alone,” she points out.

He shrugs, looking pained.

“I don’t know if it’s a good idea for you to be here, though.”

“Me neither. But… I didn’t know if it was a good idea to leave.”

Judy nods. “She might want…” She bites the inside of her cheek, deliberating. “You can stay here,” she decides.

Will looks up and meets her eyes with a rare steady gaze. “Margot’s not okay, is she?”

Judy shakes her head. “Are  _you_  going to be okay, Will?”

Will nods, unconvincingly. His dress shirt is crumpled in one hand. Absently, he takes it in both, and twists and twists it, as though he’s trying to wring out blood only he can see. Judy watches his knuckles whiten and says, softly, “I think you should call Dr. Lecter.”

“I can’t.”

“I can’t take care of you both.”

“I’ll be fine.”

Judy appraises him skeptically. “Did you sleep?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. I was trying to... I thought going back to the barn would help make some sense of it.”

“Did it work?”

“Not really.”

“Good. It  _shouldn’t_  make sense.”

Bitterly, Will mumbles, “That hasn’t really stopped my imagination before.”

Judy lays her palm against the wall and regards her new wedding band there. Plain rose gold to go with Margot’s engagement ring. “I can’t promise Margot will want to see you.”

“I’d rather be here and not needed...”

“Yeah, I’d rather that, too.” She leans her temple against the door jamb and says quietly, “Go get some sleep. I’ll have lunch brought up later. We can talk then.”

“Okay,” he agrees, and Judy can see that he is relieved to be given instruction. She couldn’t say exactly when it became her job to tell people what to do. She doesn’t care for it as much as someone in her position probably should.

 

They don’t actually eat lunch. Barney knocks on Will’s door around 2pm. Will has been lying on top of the sheets – in what he recognizes, with detachment, are probably Mason’s clothes – staring at the crown moulding, and listening to the grandfather clock imperiously mark out the passing of time without internalizing how much time is actually passing.

Judy hands him a whiskey as soon as he is shown in, and he knocks it back in one gulp without thinking. He sees Margot, slumped in the window seat, staring out over the grounds with the same unseeing gaze he’d had fixed on the ceiling of the guest room all morning. He looks to Judy for permission, then weakly says, “Margot?”

Margot doesn’t respond, or give any indication that she’s even aware of his presence. Judy goes to her and tenderly tucks a lock of Margot’s hair behind her ear. Margot leans her head back against Judy’s stomach, and Judy strokes her forehead.

“Maybe later,” Judy says quietly to Will.

“Should I go?”

“Not yet.” She walks him back to the door. Though she doesn’t mean it as a slight, but rather the direction that he so clearly needs, her terse addition of, “Might want to call Ella,” brings a tinge of red to Will’s cheeks.

“You can tell me to leave. I know you’re really the only one who can help her.”

It’s tempting, the idea of sending him away. All Judy had ever wanted was to make Margot safe. All she’s ever done has been in service of that. Margot had always been safest when it was just the two of them, and there were no voices in her head telling her she couldn’t ever have peace. It’s difficult to accept that anyone else might be good for her, and, more difficult, still, to accept that it might not be up to her because, as she admits aloud, she hasn’t got a fucking clue what to do now.

 

That evening, Judy verbalizes why, and it does nothing to lessen the burden of the knowledge. “She’ll feel permanently damaged, now.”

Will takes a sip from the glass Judy offers him, and mumbles into it, “This is damaging.”

“He’s called her whole identity into question.”

“Literal insult to literal injury.”

“But, why? The Verger name is all Mason ever held any reverence for.”

“Maybe this is his twisted form of reverence. He is proud of his swine.”

“I wasn’t really asking. Like I said, I don’t want to understand. It’s so wrong.” It sounds like she’s condemning him to be alone in that wrongness, and his face looks like the face of someone who has been condemned. “He just shit all over everything he ever told her mattered. How is she supposed to reconcile that?”

“I don’t think he meant her to.”

Judy doesn’t know why she says it, but doesn’t stop herself. “You’re not supposed to recover, either.”

“Neither are you.” Will frowns, and, a little while later, confesses, “I was unprepared to see  _what could have been_  in the flesh.”

 

That night, Margot manages to whisper, “I miss our little house.”

Judy leans up on one elbow and gazes down into Margot’s lucid, red-rimmed eyes. “I’ll buy it back.”

“It won’t be the same.”

“I know.”

Judy doesn’t tell Margot that she never sold it in the first place. Over the course of her time abroad, she’d been in constant communication with movers, painters, and decorators. Now, it sits there, freshly painted, and furnished with crib, playpen, child-proof cabinets – in an ironic stasis, prepared for the baby they’d never bring home. The nest empty before it was filled. She keeps that nugget of grief to herself.

 

Will stays another night, and doesn’t wait for Barney to come and get him the next morning. He barely thinks to wait for an answer at the door before entering the suite. Margot is still at the window. Judy is trying to engage her, without much success. Once in the room, he doesn’t know what to do.

He sits at the table next to a stack of folders Barney had brought up from Judy’s office, fiddling with one of the red tabs until she joins him at the makeshift desk. She doesn’t bother asking before pouring him a drink. “We should talk about Abigail.”

Will looks away, and downs half the glass. He looks like he might say something, but, several minutes pass – along with the second half of his drink – without him actually doing so.

Recognizing that she’ll be lucky to get a word out of him, Judy starts, “Do you know where she went?”

“What?” Will asks in a strange, strained voice.

Judy repeats the question, patient, but with growing alarm.

He squeezes his eyes shut. “No,” he whispers.

She can see he is beginning to sweat, and wonders if he’d thought to bring whatever the hell medication he’s still on, or, if he just needs another stiff drink. She pours him another scotch.

Will looks physically pained, and has one hand gripping his hair tightly, just below his scar. With the other, he takes the glass, avoiding Judy’s gaze entirely. He keeps looking back over at Margot, as though something might change in the seconds between each glance.

“I really think you should call Dr. Lecter,” Judy asserts again.

Suddenly, Will stands and begins pacing, clenching and unclenching his fists in an unsettling display of agitation.

Judy can’t help the sigh of frustration that escapes her, though she tries to keep it quiet. When Will doesn’t respond at all, she decides she has two choices: call Dr. Lecter, herself; or, air her grievances in full. Her own agitation won’t allow anything else.

“Abigail really left me in the lurch, Will,” she says, opting for the latter. “I feel disrespected.”

Will stops pacing immediately, and turns to Judy in earnest. “It’s not her fault.”

“It’s at least a little bit her fault.”

“We drove her away. Hannibal and I. It’s our fault. As usual.”

Judy closes her eyes and huffs a small, humourless breath of a laugh. “You know, I’ve just about had it with you crazy sons of bitches...”

Will can’t tell from her tone if she is including Abigail in that cohort. “I’m sorry, Judy. Don’t be mad at her.”

“I can’t help that. She could have told me.” After a pause, she adds, “Though I’m not surprised she didn’t.”

Will doesn’t have an answer to that.

 

The next day, Will helps himself to the scotch.

Margot is staring at him. He asks her something; he’s not sure what. She starts, and says,  _what?_  faintly, before slipping back into her trance-like state without waiting for an answer. A minute or two later, she stands and drifts from the window to the bed, wraith-like in both her appearance and movement. She collapses gracefully, too apathetic to pull back the blankets, and lies there, eyes shut, tears streaming down her cheeks until she has once again cried herself to sleep.

It has never been clearer to Will that Margot’s arrogantly serene demeanor is not an act, so much as it is an oasis between feeling nothing at all, and feeling indomitable sadness. “I’ll kill him,” he tells the wall behind Judy. “If you want me to.”

Judy watches him warily as he begins to pace once more. “He’s the only family she has.”

“What about your family?”

“She likes my family.” Her tone conveys very clearly that that isn’t the point. Perhaps worried he isn’t making the connections he usually does, however, she continues. “As twisted as it sounds, at least, with Mason, she knows she belongs, and knows where she stands.”

“Not anymore.”

“We don’t know that. We  _can’t_ know that. And I can’t just take him from her without her permission.”

“He’s ruined her life.”

“Can’t the same be said about Dr. Lecter and your life?”

“I get the worst and the best of him. What does Margot get from Mason?”

“A tangible adversary?”

“And you’re worried if that’s taken from her, she’ll snap?”

“Stranger things.”

Will goes to where Margot had been sitting at the window. He recognizes a few of the proposals, enough to marvel at how far she’d taken them, but the calculations taper off where she’d abruptly lost interest. What do you do with a love of problem-solving when faced, daily, with empirical proof that not all problems have solutions? He moves the top sheet to the side. Underneath are pages and pages of temporal logic. He wonders, if time did reverse, how far back Margot would go. The very beginning? Or, would she still suffer through years of abuse to find Judy? Would she maybe go back just far enough to never meet Hannibal? Never meet Will?

Will looks over at Margot, still lying in bed, frail to the point of looking shatterable, and yet, somehow, so resilient, she is still here. She is the least put together she has ever been – no armour of any sort. No lipstick in war-paint red, no carefully administered eyeliner completing a bold and angular outfit. Her hair is dull and a little greasy. Still, Will doesn’t understand how even _Mason_ could want to mar such beauty.

“I’m going to go now,” Will tells Judy. “I have to take care of something.”

Judy isn’t fazed by the sudden termination of yet another conversation. She might be more taken aback if she and Will had ever had an encounter bookended with niceties. “Take one of the town cars,” she instructs. “Don’t argue. That’s what they’re there for.”

“Do you want me to come back?”

“Honestly?”

“Honestly.”

“No. I’m sorry.”

Will nods. 

“I’ll call you, alright? In a few days.”

He nods again. “Please.”

Judy holds out her hand and they shake, solemnly. She gives his hand a reassuring squeeze. Will wonders how she can stand it – stand him, or Hannibal, or even Abigail. How she can bear being all sanity and competence in a world that just keeps taking from her. 

As he’s leaving, he sees Judy return to Margot and fit herself about her once more. She strokes her hair so tenderly, and her gaze is filled with such unadulterated love, Will thinks he’d do just about anything to give them the world they want.

 

Margot hasn’t eaten much since the wedding. On day one, Judy managed to get a spoonful of stew into her. On day two, a cup of broth was all Margot could handle, and Judy had to coach her through each sip, because she kept losing interest and putting the cup down. By day three, she is fighting to even get Margot to drink water.

Margot doesn’t speak for the most part, either. Sometimes she whispers  _yes_  or  _no_  to simple questions. Occasionally, she opens her mouth like she wants to say more, but doesn’t know what. What is there to say?

Pages of mathematical rhetoric scatter the window sill. They are all problems with no solutions. This is evident even to Judy, who has no particular love of numbers. Along with those pages are a slew of paper cranes, deteriorating in quality the more recently they’d been folded. Imprecise angles and crooked wings.

Judy is afraid to leave her alone, but it seems that Margot hasn’t the strength to do anything drastic. She’s simply going to waste away. No blood on the bathroom tiles or empty pill bottles. Judy  _does_  fear she could drown herself in the bath.

Finally, Margot descends into catatonia, and Judy goes through all five stages of grief in rapid succession, trying to rouse her from it. In the morning, she gets Barney to bring up Klinsy, and Margot is seemingly entranced by his soft, sleek fur, but remains far from comforted. Later, Judy asks, “Do you want Will?” Margot says,  _No, I want my baby_ , and Judy, once again, has no idea what to do.

 

Margot hasn’t eaten, or bathed, or moved from the bed in three days when Judy finally coaxes her into the shower. Margot cries like it’s the hardest thing in the world to do. She doesn’t have the strength to stand, so she sits, one arm hugging her knees, her cheek and hand pressed against the wall like she’s begging it to open up and swallow her. A thin stream of urine trickles towards the drain.

Judy feels her own despair beginning to take over, and has to go into the next room so Margot won’t see her tears.

 

Barney is back in his uniform, it is five days after the wedding, and Cordell is nowhere to be seen. Still, Barney feels small when Judy opens the door, sleep-deprived enough not to pretend she was giving him the benefit of the doubt.

“Did you know?” she barks at him.

“No.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I set up some medical equipment. Didn’t ask questions. I’ve learned not to.”

Judy takes a livid, shaky breath. “Don’t you dare use that as an excuse.”

“Ms. Ingram. You need to sleep.” Barney slowly lowers his chin and eyes to the floor. “You need to sleep,” he repeats. “I’ll stay. I’ve been on suicide watch before.”

Her hand comes away from the resounding slap bright red and stinging. They look at each other for a long time. Then, Judy turns and walks back to the bed. Barney follows her. She wraps herself around Margot, and, finally, lets her eyes fall shut.

Barney pulls a chair up beside them, and a blanket up over them.

It’s as much for his own comfort as theirs. So he doesn’t have to think about Margot’s legs, emerging wet from the shower in the gym, beads of water clinging to her carefully manicured pubic hair, droplets sliding down her stomach, flat and smooth except for the scar.

He’d thought she was being cruel, but, now, he knows what real cruelty looks like.

Margot’s eyes are open and watching him in the dark. He averts his gaze.

“Did you ever see me as more than the sum of my parts?”

Regret and shame crack his voice slightly. “I do now.”

She is awake only long enough to pass judgement on him.

“Ms. Ingram,” he says into the darkness, a little while later.

“Ms. Verger,” Judy corrects him huskily, still mostly asleep.

“I’m sorry.”

“I know. You’d better be.” More silence, and then, “Barney?”

“Yes, Ms. Verger?”

She nuzzles the wispy hairs behind Margot’s ear. “You’re fired.”

And Barney whispers, “Thank you.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the lovely wormsin ([wormsin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormsin/pseuds/wormsin) on A03, and [@wormsin](https://wormsin.tumblr.com) on tumblr). They have been so helpful and supportive editing these next chapters and I cannot thank them enough. They are also insanely talented in both the visual art department (check out their tumblr!) and the writing department (check out their amazing and sexy Hannigram fic, ["A Mirror in the Dark"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10728969)!).
> 
> Continued thanks to my partner, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), the best murderwife in the universe, and the love of my life. <3
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	12. Frighteningly Amicable

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal gets a teensy bit impatient waiting for Ardelia to tell him what happened with Clarice Starling, so he pulls out all the stops in the flirtation department. It’s eye-rollingly self-serving, but it’s less annoying than it ought to be because Ardelia is not a dumbass, and the closer they become, the warier she is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the lovely wormsin ([wormsin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormsin/pseuds/wormsin) on A03, and [@wormsin](https://wormsin.tumblr.com) on tumblr). They have been so helpful and supportive editing these next chapters and I cannot thank them enough. They are also insanely talented in both the visual art department (check out their tumblr!) and the writing department (check out their amazing and sexy Hannigram fic, ["A Mirror in the Dark"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10728969)!).
> 
> Continued thanks to my partner, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), the best murderwife in the universe, and the love of my life. <3
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)

In the week following the wedding, Hannibal and Ardelia dine together on several occasions, though she is unable to join him in preparing the first meal. She is, in fact, almost late. Early in the afternoon, she calls to warn him that she might not make it on time, and Hannibal rethinks that evening’s menu. He decides on a simpler meal, less involved, and more filling. A meal for cold days – the kind of meal Cook used to make when he was a very young boy in Lithuania. In those days, Lecter Castle in winter looked, from the outside, like the Snow Queen’s palace, and felt, from the inside, like the only warm place on earth. It would all be cold now. _Almost._

On the phone, Ardelia sounds distracted, tired, and cranky, the way one does when they haven’t eaten all day. So, he makes  _didžkukuliai_ , and hot beet stew. Neither dish affords much in the way of aesthetics, but, today, he has no interest in preparing something more pleasing to the eye if it might go unappreciated, or, worse, elicit desultory compliments from her. He knows she wouldn’t care for it either.

Having come straight from the office, Ardelia is unadorned and wearing one of her pant suits. She is quite obviously laden with whatever they had uncovered today at the BAU, and rather tight-lipped to begin with. However, all this is replaced by utter bliss the moment she takes a bite of potato dumpling and tastes the juicy minced meat inside. She eats a few mouthfuls with some gusto.

“I feel human again,” Ardelia says, with a contented sigh. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure. As always.”

Ardelia very straightforwardly opens the conversation with, “I think you know I have questions.”

“About Dr. du Maurier, I presume?”

“Yes. Her surprise reappearance. What can you tell me?”

Hannibal looks away with a frown, appearing to admonish himself. “I could tell you a lot, but I’m afraid it would not interest you. We got rather caught up mending bridges. I didn’t think to question her.”

“That’s probably for the best.” Ardelia sighs. “We were at a wedding, after all. Have your bridges been adequately mended?”

“ _Adequate_  is exactly the descriptor I would choose for our reparations. There was significant trust lost when our relationship ended – I fear irrevocably.”

“Not your doctor-patient relationship.”

“No.”

There is a pause during which Ardelia scents her wine. She takes a long draught before conceding, with another sigh, “I have no reason to be suspicious of her.”

“You believe she’s hiding something.”

“I have no real reason to believe that, either, but… seeing her turn up like that – on the heels of shutting down our investigation – it smarted.”

Hannibal reaches across the table to pat her hand. “Your instincts are good. Don’t let self-doubt cloud them.”

Ardelia gives a small laugh and says, not unkindly, “I’d take your advice, but you just admitted to being a spurned ex-lover.”

“I did no such thing.”

“Now, I have to take into consideration your motives.”

“That is wise.”

 

Unfortunately, considering motives has been getting them next to nowhere in the lab.

“Well,” Price begins. “We’ve managed to establish  _one_ thing.”

Zeller nods. “A second person  _had_  to have been there.”

“If it was murder, obviously, but, even if it was an accident–”

“Liza’s interviews paid off. There’s no way they got into those positions on their own.”

“Good.” Mapp nods for them to continue. It is just before lunch on Tuesday, and this is actually more than Mapp had hoped for.

“Two back-to-back cases of kinky assisted suicide seems unlikely. Moreso three.”

“Ditto someone who accidentally  _killed_  a person trying to _learn the ropes_ again so soon.”

“That would be rather sociopathic,” Mapp agrees.

“Right. So, I’d say we have a budding serial killer,” Price concludes.

Lake backs into the room with an armful of rope parcelled into clear plastic bags just in time to hear Price. She pauses long enough on her shortcut through the morgue to nod emphatically.

“Where are you going?” Zeller calls after her.

She lifts one of the packages of rope. “To put my to-do list down.”

“You can leave that here,” Price offers. “I’ll take care of it after lunch.”

“Hm. Okay. I  _do_  have numbers to crunch…” She sets her load down on an empty gurney. “Since you boys don’t want to take on the killer’s height and weight,” she adds, teasing.

Zeller pouts. “Look, kiddo, it’s been awhile since first year physics, okay?”

“I know.” She chuckles to herself as she leaves them.

“Oh, to be young again,” Price laments.

“Cute as hell, isn’t she?” Zeller says, forgetting, as he usually does, that Mapp is privy to the whole exchange. “I’m gonna go help.”

“You know she was poking fun at us,” Price points out.

“Yeah, but, man… I just love her so much.” He shrugs helplessly and follows Lake into the adjacent lab.

Mapp crosses the room to contemplate the cork board on the far wall, saying, “I can see why you’re predicting an imminent proposal.”

Price joins her. “Cute as hell, aren’t they?”

Before becoming fully absorbed in the collage of pictures tacked to the board, Mapp glances through the glass wall to where Zeller and Lake are seated opposite each other at one of the benches. She sees them settle from blissful flirtation into deep concentration at the exact same moment. She’s tempted to continue watching, to see how they work together – as a department head it’s really something she ought to keep an eye on. Price interrupts her analysis of the couple.

“Listen, Boss,” he begins.

She turns and gives him her full attention. “It sounds like you have a bone to pick with me.”

Price waves his hand, dismissing the notion. “No, I know you have your reasons for firing Will.”

“Suspending,” she corrects, and gives him a puzzled look.

“Suspending Will. We could use an outside set of eyes though, that’s all. Zee will deny it to the bitter end, but, it helps.”

Mapp nods. “I can’t in good conscience allow Will to continue working here,” she starts.

“Still sick, isn’t he?”

She frowns. “It’s not my place to say.”

Price shrugs. “This work is terrible for him. We all know it. There wasn’t really ever anything we could do about it though.”

“Agent Crawford?” It’s hardly a question anymore.

“ _Bad luck that he’s the best_ , Jack used to say.”

Mapp sighs. “I do have my concerns about Will, but my responsibility is to this department. I’ll make finding a replacement top priority. I appreciate you voicing your thoughts on the matter.”

“Thought I’d try heading disaster off at the pass. Hopefully we can get a new Will before a new victim.”

“I’ll do my best. Did you have anyone in mind?”

“You’re friendly with Dr. Lecter, right?”

 

Hannibal and Ardelia meet again the very next evening at the Smithsonian, for the opening of an art exhibit, and it quickly becomes clear that  _friendly_  is an understatement. Hannibal holds the door to the Pavilion open for her as they enter the restaurant, and keeps his hand on the small of her back or under her elbow as they are led to their table.

“Thank you for meeting me halfway,” Ardelia says as they settle in their seats. “Your kitchen is beautiful, but I was in such a rush last time. I’d like to do a better job of enjoying our evenings.”

Though she looks no better-rested, she appears more relaxed than she had at their previous dinner, and Hannibal is pleased to see that, since their talk of taste, she is no longer secretive about scenting her wine.

“Of course,” he replies, adding, “You look lovely,” enjoying the brief tensing of her shoulders and faint pink in her cheeks.

She does, indeed, look lovely. When they order, she turns her head and tilts her chin to address the waiter, and her earing swings slightly at the movement. It looks like a piece of the elaborate headdress worn by the Guardian in her front room. Red berries on a golden stem. Or droplets of blood against her neck.

When the waiter departs, Ardelia clears her throat and says, “I’ve been complimented before, but you’ve managed to make it utterly disarming.”

“Not inappropriately so, I hope.”

“No,” she agrees. “It’s nice to be complimented when you’ve made an effort.”

“You have a natural exotic beauty,” Hannibal comments, as though they are interfacing on a piece of artwork. Then, he meets her eyes with his own, which are twinkling in blatant flirtation. “The additional effort has yielded stunning results.”

Ardelia hums, lips pursed around a widening smile. “Want to hear a funny story?”

“Please.”

“Back when I had some semblance of a social life, I went on a date with a fellow intern – well-intentioned, but painful to hold conversation with. One beer in, he told me he was bewitched by my beauty.”

“Dear me.”

“And then I had to listen to a fumbling apology and a five-minute explanation of why he’s not a racist. I said, I’m Jamaican, not Haitian, and it wasn’t offensive anyway, but, at that point, it’s safe to say the date was over.”

Hannibal chuckles. “So, despite a familiarity with compliments, you have yet to master the art of receiving them?”

“Correct. Although, in that particular case, I’d say the man in question had yet to master the art of _giving_ them.”

“I hope your sharing of that anecdote was more to contrast than to compare.”

Their faces are both alight with humour at this point. With another tilt of her head that sets her earring swinging, she says, “Oh, I think you know that it was.”

Hannibal lifts his wine, and, as their glasses clink together, he says, beaming outright, “To compliments. Well given, and entirely deserved.”

 

The exhibition doesn’t hold their interest. They read the placard on one of the multimedia displays, and watch, for a few minutes, a looped black and white video projected on one of the walls. In the center of the gallery, a performance artist plucks through a cycle of minor chords on an electric guitar, while an aerialist rains sequins down on him from above.

It isn’t long before Ardelia is massaging her temple in annoyance.

Hannibal empathizes completely. “You’re not enjoying yourself. Would you like to leave?”

“I’d like to jump off a building,” she grumbles. “Apologies. I’m still very tired.”

“We can come back another time. Though, perhaps we’ll have better luck with the permanent exhibits.”

“I might not be the best company for these things. Clearly, I don’t understand art.”

Hannibal laughs rather heartily at that. “I assure you, I understood none of that.”

They are turning from the scene when they hear a scoff nearby.

“It represents the relativity of concepts like music and beauty.” A bespectacled young man wearing a fedora that only partially distracts from the greasiness of his hair, hovers by the placard, poorly hiding that he is responsible for the display. “You’re obviously a modernist. The easier art is upstairs.” He folds his arms and gives them a disdainful smile.

Hannibal notes that the glasses he wears lack lenses, and smiles back, widely.

 

 _Later, as he’s preparing to chop off the man’s hand, Hannibal leans close and says, in a frighteningly amicable voice, “Communicating badly and then acting smug when you’re not understood is neither clever nor artistic. 1 I hope you’ll bear that in mind next time inspiration strikes.” When the tourniquet is tied and antiseptic applied, he explains, “This represents _ _moral relativity. Do you understand?”_

_“Why are you doing this?” the man whines. “Can’t a person disagree with you about art?”_

_“Certainly. But there is no need to be rude about it.” The hand comes off cleanly, despite the man’s struggling. Hannibal exscinds a patch of skin from the back of the hand, grafts it neatly onto the wrist stump, and dresses the amputation site. “There. In time, you’ll be able to strum again. Perhaps your other hand will be choosier about where it lays its fingers, and take into consideration the ears of its patrons.”_

_Then, he soaks a rag with enough ether to eradicate all but the message from the man’s memory._

 

After this arrogant dismissal, Hannibal feigns good-natured exasperation at the young  _artist_ and his behaviour. “I’m fonder of the Greek sculptures on the second floor,” he says, helping Ardelia on with her coat. “There is also a recently-acquired collection that might please you. On an evening that has less… musical accompaniment.”

“You have a gift for euphemisms.”

“Sound effects?”

Ardelia hums in agreement and loops her arm through his as they step out into the chill night air.

Hannibal registers this victory, and it is a victory, in itself, that he is able to hide his glee.

 

They walk past the outdoor ice rink. Warm lamps and cold starlight create a very specific atmosphere, and Hannibal couldn’t ask for a better one. As evidenced by the many couples holding hands as they skate, or huddling together at the edges of the rink, sharing hot chocolate, the crisp white light from the distant stars invites people to seek out human warmth, and the yellow glow from the lamps, lanterns, and heaters, assure them that such a search is universal, and welcome.

Ardelia is almost as tall as Hannibal, which makes it easy for him to breathe in her scent without getting too close. He discerns that her neck smells divine, and her shampoo is something herbaceous and spicy. Ardelia makes the slightest of movements, about to remove her hand so she can put on her gloves. Hannibal feels the miniscule shift of her hand on his arm and forestalls any further withdrawal by folding his own larger, warmer hand over hers.

Ardelia doesn’t protest. She slips her other hand into the pocket of her coat, and they continue walking. Her eyes are bright and her cheeks pink again, perhaps simply from the cold, but, perhaps not.

“Where to, now?” Ardelia asks.

“I thought the Sculpture Garden at the Hirshhorn Museum,” Hannibal proposes.

She doesn’t reply.

“If you’re not too cold?”

She shakes her head, and gives his arm a faint squeeze beneath his hand.

They walk a few more paces in silence, then Hannibal queries, “Is something wrong, Ardelia?”

“Hm? Oh, absolutely not.” Ardelia smile returns, though it is pinched at the corners. “I was just suddenly very conscious of how long it’s been since I went anywhere with anyone for the sake of it.”

“Quite a while, I take it?”

“It’s not healthy, I know.”

“Very intelligent people often take comfort in solitude.”

“I’m not exactly taking comfort in it,” Ardelia says quietly.

They come upon the entrance to the garden, and Hannibal stops and faces her. She unwinds her arm, and he puts a hand on each of her shoulders gently. “When was the last time?” He is intentionally non-specific in his phrasing of the question, giving her the opportunity to offer more, or less information, as she liked.

To his disappointment, she chooses to share less, rather than more. “Starling and I came here when the Wish Tree was planted.”

As she takes his arm again and they continue walking, Hannibal reminds himself that their friendship is progressing faster than he’d initially expected.  _Patience_.

Ardelia surprises him a moment later, though, by adding, “I’ll never love like that again.” It is factual, rather than melodramatic, and he doesn’t doubt that she is right. She glances at him, biting the inside of her lip thoughtfully. At length, she simply shrugs, and concludes, “Makes it difficult to care much about dating.”

“Are you ever lonely, Ardelia?”

“Not in the usual way.”

Though he wants to ask for an explanation, he has learned that Ardelia is not one for swapping metaphors or embellishing. Neither is she vague unless she doesn’t want to talk about something.

“Are  _you_  lonely?” Ardelia returns.

“I’m used to living a solitary existence. Loneliness is a relatively new sensation.”

“So, yes.”

“Yes. Often.” Hannibal decides perhaps it is safe to ask, after all. “What do you mean,  _not in the usual way_?”

Ardelia gives another small shrug. “I’m alone a lot. But I never crave company, I just miss her.”

“You crave  _her_  company.”

“Yes. I imagine you know what that’s like.”

Hannibal opts, once again, to simply nod.

Though it was never verbally agreed that it would be their destination, they both slow as they approach the Wish Tree.

 

“I couldn’t help but notice you and Will dancing at the wedding,” Hannibal says, when they come to stand in front of the celebrated Japanese Dogwood. “Is it safe to assume you made reparations of your own?”

“It was fairly easy,” Ardelia replies. “I think Will knows me well enough to understand that it isn’t personal.”

“He may know that logically, but I’ve found that there is little in this world Will doesn’t take personally.”

“I know my limitations, Dr. Lecter. As long as Will understands logically, I consider that a win.”

Hannibal chuckles. “As you should.”

“I don’t want to push,” she explains. “The last time I tried to force an explanation on him, he had a breakdown in my office. The less said about it, the better, don’t you think?”

“Yes, I believe you’re right.”

They regard the stark branches of the naked Wish Tree in silence for several minutes. Ardelia takes her hand back and puts it in her pocket, hunching her shoulders against the cold. In a fit of whimsy (that he will later recognize as having been potentially disastrous), Hannibal puts an arm around her.

Ardelia responds by moving ever-so-slightly closer, tacitly permitting the action. After a few more long moments, she observes, “We talk about Will a lot,” her tone veiled.

Hannibal finds that, once again, it is not difficult to sound sincere. His design is to appear vulnerable, and apologetic. When the words are on his tongue, the effect is easily achieved, and he is genuinely loath to let them out. “I miss him.”

She nods, still gazing at the Wish Tree thoughtfully. After some more silence, she says, very quietly, “I hope there’s more to our friendship than mutual loss.”

Hannibal collects himself, extinguishing the anger that sparked in him upon admitting, in such an unadorned manner, what he knows to be true. He turns to her, determined to get them back on track. Ardelia’s chin is tucked into her scarf. Her gaze is lowered, but she lifts it to him when he says, voice soft and deep, “I’d hoped a present mutual interest.” His eyes meet hers, and, working off another impulse, he suddenly requests to draw her.

She smiles at that, though surprise is apparent on her face. Her look is the same one she’d given him when he’d suggested making a bouquet from her garden – that of encountering non-threatening strangeness and not knowing what exactly to do with it. “I don’t think I could sit still for long with you staring at me.”

“I tend to draw from memory,” he assures her.

“You must have some memory.”

“I do.”

“Then, why do you ask?” she inquires, with a puzzled tilt of her head. “Do you always ask?”

“No,” Hannibal replies. “But, then, I don’t often share the finished work with my subjects, and I _would_ like to share this with you.”

All she says, pulling her ungloved hands from her pocket so she can fiddle with her ring, is “Hm.”

It is impossible to discern from Ardelia’s tone or expression whether or not she is agreeing to his request. Hannibal decides another factually-stated compliment is in order. “I won’t pretend I don’t find you both attractive and, more importantly, captivating.”

She lowers her gaze again and studies her hands. “Thank you.”

He is delighted that she doesn’t blurt out some inane nicety in return. It would be frivolous, and beneath her. He changes the subject, following her gaze down to her fingers. “A promise ring?”

Ardelia slips her hands back into her pockets, hiding the emerald. “More of a peace offering.” Hannibal’s interest is piqued all over again, but, before he can begin to question her, she notes, “The branches were covered in in paper ribbons when we were here.”

“In the winter it is called the _Whisper Tree_ ,” he informs her, biting back renewed impatience. He removes his arm from around her shoulders, and steps aside, indicating the tree with a sweep of his other arm.

“You go first,” Ardelia prompts.

Hannibal shakes his head with affected sadness and self-deprecation. “During the summer months, this poor tree was quite laden with my wishes – I’m afraid I have used all mine up.”

Ardelia gives him her half-sympathetic half-smile before leaving his side. She has to crouch down beneath the branches to get to the bole of the tree, where she leans her cheek against the trunk and whispers.

Hannibal watches, believing he is a witness to something very private. This is confirmed when Ardelia returns to him, looking drained and, perhaps, even close to tears.

“I think I’d like to go home now,” she says apologetically.

Hannibal nods and offers his arm once more. “I’ll walk you to your car.”

“You can walk me to a cab.” She smiles faintly, and loops her arm through his. They leave the garden the way they came in.

“Would you allow me to drive you home?” Ardelia is exactly where Hannibal wants her to be, defenses evidently weakened. Vulnerable. When she protests his offer, he will defer to her, and the rejection will be like a pulled thread in her mind – something to pick at and unravel as she sits in the back seat of a cab, on her way back to an empty house.

Ardelia gives him a grateful smile, but does, indeed, protest. “I asked you to meet me halfway...”

Hannibal inclines his head in polite agreement.

However, his plan does not unfold as he intends it to. They continue down the National Mall, even as several hail-able cabs pass them by. They walk together until they reach Hannibal’s car, in which they huddle for a few minutes while the engine warms. Then, they are on the road.

The evening ends with Ardelia’s coat draped over the bannister in her front room, cab fare still in her pocket. Hannibal finds himself driving under cold starlight, lamps replaced with harsh highway glare, home to Baltimore, alone.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Hannibal embodying an [xkcd comic](https://xkcd.com/169/) that perfectly illustrates how I feel about dumbasses and postmodernists.


	13. A Devious Exploitation of Language (Or - Flirting's Back on the Menu)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal and Will need to take lessons from Zeller and Lake on how to be in love properly. Instead, Hannibal gets down and flirty with Ardelia Mapp. Fortunately, Ardelia is also Hannigram trash.

Mapp’s Thursday begins with an unwelcome phone call and a stack of misdelivered mail. She deals with the former first, then, somewhat perturbed by what she has learned, heads down to the lab to deal with the latter.

“I’ve got a tox screen for you, here, Agent Price. It was in my inbox, but I’m certain it wasn’t meant to be.”

“You mean you haven’t scraped together a biochemistry degree in all the spare time you’ve had lately?” Price takes the envelope she holds out and appraises the neatly torn edge with a grin. “Look how tidy this is! Hey Zee. This is how you open an envelope.”

Already more at ease, Mapp quirks her eyebrow and says, “With a letter opener?”

“Zee doesn’t usually take advantage of that kind of equipment.” Price points to the spread of lab reports on the desk, already read and waiting to be filed. Some, presumably opened by Zeller, are distinctly roughed up. It isn’t difficult for Mapp to imagine him ignoring the flap and ripping it open along the short edge instead, misjudging the placement within the envelope, and tearing into the contents themselves.

“That’s mine,” Zeller calls from the lab next door. “What does it say?” He and Lake are at the white board, discussing the calculations scrawled across it. Gesturing to the glass doors currently propped open, he adds, by way of explanation to Mapp, “Freedom of information.”

Price rolls his eyes. “Just laziness.” He slides the results out of the envelope and skims them.

“The signs say  _no running in the lab_ , not  _no yelling in the lab_ ,” Zeller points out, then repeats, “What does it say?”

Price rolls the papers into a makeshift megaphone and announces, “ _Nothing we didn’t already know_.” He deposits the new report atop the others and wanders over to the two. “How about you kids?”

Mapp follows him. She nods at Agent Lake when she turns to give Mapp her usual nervous smile. “Yes, please fill me in.”

“Well,” Lake begins, capping her pen but continuing to fiddle with it. “None of the rooms the victims were found in are very big. Given their dimensions, and the weights of the victims, I can say the killer isn’t less than 120 pounds, and most likely isn’t more than 160 – but I still have to narrow it down.”

“Excellent. Height?”

“Still working on that.” Looking more self-conscious than usual, she picks up the eraser and starts clearing some room on the whiteboard. Zeller catches her eye and gives her a meaningful look. Lake bites her lip and turns back to Mapp. “Um, Agent Mapp… I was wondering if I could have tomorrow off?”

“That’s fine by me.” Mapp looks to Price and Zeller.

“We’re fine,” Zeller agrees, and Price nods as well.

Mapp tilts her head quizzically. “May I ask why, Agent Lake?”

“I was just hoping to make a doctor’s appointment.” Lake reverts back to her old level of timidity in asking for this favour. Her volume drops and her voice goes up at the end of the sentence, as though it’s a question.

“Is everything alright?”

Lake nods emphatically. Zeller nudges her with his elbow. “Just been feeling a little light-headed the past few days,” she discloses, blushing deeply.

“You have plenty of sick days, Agent Lake. If you need to take some time off–”

Lake shakes her head equally emphatically.

Price chuckles. “You tried,” he says to Mapp.

Mapp looks at her watch. “Speaking of time, I’ll be in meetings for the next few hours. I’ll check in with you all this afternoon.”

Zeller gives her a thumbs up.

As she and Price start to walk away, Price asks, “What’s with all the meetings?”

“Well, I’ve got Kade Prurnell coming to  _see how I’ve settled in_. Then a conference call with Arlington. Then I’m at St. Elizabeth’s until two.”

“Oooh.” Price is his usual intrigued self, but, before he can ask, they hear Zeller’s doting Liza-voice.

“I’d better get back in there, too – miles of rope to comb.” Mapp and Price both glance over their shoulders in time to see Zeller give Lake a quick kiss on the forehead and say, “I’ll leave you with your force diagrams.”

Caught out, Mapp can’t help but return the secret little smile Price gives her when their eyes meet. She sucks in her cheeks to keep the smile from growing when he draws a heart in the air with his fingers and mouths,  _true love_.

 

Hannibal doesn’t text or phone Ardelia for all of Thursday. He is rewarded with an urgency in her tone when she phones him the following afternoon, presumably on a belated lunch break. She cuts to the chase immediately, without more than a cursory greeting. “I have some news. Dinner?”

“Certainly. Are you alright?”

“I’m fine.”

“Very well. Your place or mine?”

“Mine, if you wouldn’t mind the drive.”

“I would drive twice that distance if it meant another evening in your company.”

Ardelia gives a courteous breath of a laugh, but she is distracted, and evidently not in the mood to flirt.

Hannibal adopts a more serious tone. “Can I be of any assistance today?”

“Hm.” Ardelia sounds as though she hadn’t considered that, or, as though she had considered it too much. “I don’t think there’s anything new worth the commute to Quantico. I’m bogged down at the moment. I’ve a dozen reports still to read… Hang on a second–” Hannibal hears her muffled voice address someone. A moment later, she uncovers the mouthpiece on her phone and says, “Sorry. Agent Price just hailed me. They  _could_ do with a fresh set of eyes if you’re willing to come down here.”

“Of course.”

“I’ll drive us to my place afterwards – it’s only fair.”

Hannibal smirks. It’s not a direct invitation for him to spend the night, but it does imply the need for coordination, and likely an offer of cab fare which he will decline. On the drive to Quantico, he thinks about the wine he’d selected for the evening, and applauds himself.

 

Price intercepts Hannibal at the elevators, and shepherds him to the lab before he can start towards Agent Mapp’s office.

“We’ve been talking in circles all day, and Liza’s not here to rescue us.”

“Oh? Where is Agent Lake?”

“She has the day off. Bet you anything she comes in before we close up shop though. That girl doesn’t know how  _not_ to work.”

 

Indeed, stopping for a coffee on her way down to the lab not an hour later, Mapp sees Lake sitting in the mostly empty lobby, and charts a new course towards her. “Agent Lake, I thought you were taking the day.”

Flustered as usual, Lake looks up from her phone, blushes, and slips it into her pocket, text message unsent. She appears especially timid with neither her lab coat nor her FBI windbreaker, either of which she wears like a suit of armour on most days. “I am, but… Um. Can I – I just need to borrow Zee for a minute.”

Mapp gives her a puzzled look. “Of course,” she says. “Why are you waiting up here?”

Lake titters nervously. “I know your policy. I thought I might get in trouble if you caught me in the lab.”

Mapp smiles in agreement. “Good. I’m glad the message stuck. I’m just on my way down there now – does he know you’re here or shall I send him up?”

“Oh – no, he doesn’t. I’ll just wait ‘til you guys are done…”

“Alright. Shouldn’t be long. Maybe fifteen minutes or so. Since you’re here, anyway, I’d like to speak with you about a possible assignment. Shall we meet at my office in say… half an hour?”

Lake is still a little red in the face, but manages to stammer out an affirmative response.

 

“What’s the story, gentlemen?”

Hannibal is off to one side, perusing the summaries of six different autopsy reports, a slight frown on his face. He looks up and flashes a brief smile at Agent Mapp when she enters, but leaves the explanations to Zeller and Price.

“More of the same, mostly.”

“We did do a couple follow-up interviews, though.”

“Anything helpful?” Mapp asks.

“Just corroborating. The two that did this on the regular had fellow riggers appraise the hard points. They seem to agree that they  _could_ have been accidents, if some of the knots failed, and the spotter panicked.”

“But–” Zeller interjects. “Again, they were super experienced and knot-savvy.”

“So, we’re thinking that at _least_ those two weren’t accidents?”

“I mean, even experts have accidents, but, two experienced riggers dead from amateur mistakes, one right after the other? We don’t think so.”

“What about the third?”

“The third guy _was_ an amateur, if he was into rope at all – so, it  _could_ have been an accident. But, say we go with murder – there’s still no sign of a struggle. I think Liza might be right. This could be a woman. An attractive woman, seductive, persuasive.”

Hannibal clears his throat. “I think it might be beneficial to factor in the blood alcohol content,” he puts forward. “High, in all the victims.”

“Not to mention the staining on the lips,” Price adds.

“Wine?”

“Definitely.”

“So, we’re looking for an average-sized, attractive seductress, armed with persuasion and/or a bottle opener.”

“Couldn’t have summed it up better myself, Boss.”

“You’re getting good at these one-liners,” Zeller agrees.

“Unfortunately, it seems most of my job is to take the basics of your reports and translate them into Bureauese for the higher-ups.”

“Better you than me,” says Price.

Zeller nods. “Boring.”

 

A few minutes later, when they’re all focused on their various tasks and readings, Zeller checks his phone, then excuses himself with an, “Oh shit! Liza texted. I’ll be right back.”

Ten minutes or so after that, Price starts cleaning up. Zeller isn’t  _right back_ , or even  _back_ , and, about five minutes later, Price hangs up his lab coat and announces that he’s going to hit the road.

Mapp looks up from her report. “Without me forcing you to? Goodness.”

She begins to pack up, as well, and Hannibal takes her lead. “I have a quick meeting with Agent Lake, and then we can go. Is that alright?” she asks, as she locks up the lab behind them.

“Of course.” Hannibal doesn’t mind in the least. There is plenty of planning to do.

When they reach the main floor, however, Mapp stops, looking across the lobby with a small smile on her face. Hannibal follows her gaze and sees Agent Zeller with his arms wrapped around Agent Lake’s waist. Their foreheads are pressed together, and, even at this distance, Hannibal can see that Zeller’s eyes are wet. Lake has a card in her hand, and they are both smiling.

“Never mind. Meeting cancelled.” Mapp takes her phone and types out a message to Lake.

_We’ll meet tomorrow. You two go home now – that is a direct order. Congratulations._

After a moment’s charming hesitation, Hannibal sees her add a smiley face and send it.

 

“That was quick work for someone who claims to have no background in psychology.”

“I said my background wasn’t in psychology, not that I have no psychology in my background.”

“Such a devious exploitation of language, Agent Mapp. May I be so bold as to say that is unlike you?”

“Do you feel misled, Dr. Lecter?”

With flirting back on the table, Hannibal turns his head and gives her a mischievous smile. “I’m sure it’s not the first time you’ve led someone astray.”

“Or bewitched them?” Ardelia suggests, with an equal amount of mischief in her voice.

“Perhaps that is more accurate. I might feel misled, if I believed that someone with no education in psychological problem-solving could become the head of Behavioural Science at the FBI.”

“Oh, I don’t think I’m here for that.” At his suddenly quizzical expression, she shrugs one shoulder and clarifies, “The psychological problem-solving I mean.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Well, you wouldn’t catch me cracking cases on my own, but I have a head for operations.” Ardelia nods politely as Hannibal holds the door for her. As she does the buttons up on her coat, she adds, “And, let’s be honest, that’s all this department really needed.”

After a beat, Hannibal comments, “You’re still angry with Agent Crawford.”

Ardelia doesn’t deny it. “It’s my own fault for assuming our freshman construct of him was accurate.”

Though somewhat disappointed that their conversation has taken a sober turn once more, Hannibal adopts a sympathetic tone. “Still, the humanization of an idol can feel like a betrayal.”

Ardelia tilts her head to the side thoughtfully. “It does feel like that.”

 

When they reach the parking lot to find it mostly empty, Ardelia curses under her breath. Louder, she apologizes to Hannibal. “I don’t know how it got so late.”

“Would you still like to do dinner?”

She hesitates. “I’m worried about driving you back to your car later.”

“We can take separate vehicles. Your offer was very kind, but unnecessary.” When she doesn’t answer for a full minute, Hannibal comes to the conclusion that she wants to cancel, and is trying to word this politely. He takes her arm and gives it a gentle squeeze, feeling for the pulse beneath the fabric. As he imagines her life blood rushing past his hand under her skin, he forgives her. “Why don’t we postpone until Saturday?” He dismisses his annoyance entirely, and suggests, “We can make a day of it.”

Ardelia gives him a wry smile and shakes her head. “I don’t think I’ll have time to  _make a day_ of anything. I suggest you make other plans for the weekend.” Then, to his surprise, she goes on to say, “I didn’t mean  _no_ to tonight.”

“What  _did_ you mean, Ardelia?”

With a sigh, she elaborates. “I’ve been asking a lot of people lately, not just you. It’s a long drive from Baltimore to Quantico, though, so I feel like I’m putting you out especially, asking you to come here. That being said, Price asked for you specifically, which leaves me toeing the line between responsible boss and responsible friend.”

With pleasingly appropriate timing, they find themselves equidistant from their two vehicles.

“Ardelia, I don’t want you to worry about inconveniencing me,” Hannibal says, voice soft and reassuring. “Your company is the thing I look forward to most these days, and I have little in the way of commitments. You are working hard. I am not. Your schedule is not as flexible as mine.”

He phrases this carefully, trying, once again, to steer her decision. It has worked innumerable times with others – they are so grateful for the understanding, they are even more determined not to require it.

Once again, his words do not have the intended effect. After a thoughtful pause, Ardelia makes her choice. “Maybe we should take separate vehicles.”

Alone in his car once more, Hannibal decides he isn’t entirely disappointed. Ardelia is struggling with something internally, and he will enjoy it the same way he enjoys watching Will battle his conscience. Not knowing the full scope of the struggle is terribly exciting.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the lovely wormsin ([wormsin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormsin/pseuds/wormsin) on A03, and [@wormsin](https://wormsin.tumblr.com) on tumblr). They have been so helpful and supportive editing these next chapters and I cannot thank them enough. They are also insanely talented in both the visual art department (check out their tumblr!) and the writing department (check out their amazing and sexy Hannigram fic, ["A Mirror in the Dark"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10728969)!).
> 
> Continued thanks to my partner, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), the best murderwife in the universe, and the love of my life. <3
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	14. A Hedonist Abroad & A Drunk in Florida

They eat in the front room again, bowls of hot meatball stew warming their laps. This time, Hannibal doesn’t lament the absence of a proper table, and decides he quite likes the intimate atmosphere created by the shared plate stacked with flatbread and the bottle of wine uncorked on the coffee table.

What he is growing weary of is Ardelia’s subdued silence, peppered with inane apologies about dinner not being anything fancy. As she stood at the stove, deftly but absently flipping chapattis, Hannibal had the distinct impression that even the usual hand on the small of her back would be unwelcome. By the time they take their seats, they haven’t touched once. If this is about the other night, whether a clumsy expression of discomfort, or a thinly-veiled rejection, it simply will not do.

He allows for a few mouthfuls of stew to be ingested without any meaningful exchange, then prepares to broach the subject. As he is about to speak, however, Ardelia does first.

“I’m sure you know this, but, if I’ve been distant the past couple days, it has nothing to do with you.”

Hannibal takes up his wine to hide a small smile he cannot repress.

Ardelia plucks at the flaky dough between her thumb and forefinger, seeming to have little appetite. She tilts her head as she looks to him for confirmation. “You know that, right?”

“I’ll admit, I was worried.” He sets his expression to puzzled and uncertain.

She sighs and shakes her head. “I’m sorry.”

“No apology necessary. May I ask what  _is_ troubling you?”

Ardelia takes a few sips of her wine before she says, in a voice hardened around the edges with frustration, “It’s this job.”

“A specific aspect of this job?” Hannibal coaxes, leaning over to top up her glass. When he sits back, he finds her watching him carefully and, for a brief moment, wonders if he’d given something away. He does the only thing he can do, and stares back from behind a mask of friendly, oblivious concern.

“Can I be frank for a moment?”

“If I’m honest, Ardelia, I have never witnessed you be anything but.”

Ardelia nods. “I like you,” she states. “I’m not sure I trust you, but I like you, so that bothers me.”

Hannibal brings a hand to his chin and taps it thoughtfully with his forefinger. “I don’t imagine your position lends itself to trusting people.”

“No,” she agrees.

He ponders this, leaning back as though he is contemplating it from a purely philosophical standpoint. At length, he offers, “It can be difficult to ascertain where, exactly, the line is between not trusting someone, and warring with the idea of trust itself. Is it me in particular you don’t trust?”

“If I’m honest, I don’t trust Will, either.”

“I’d like to earn your trust.”

“I’d like to grant you it.”

Hannibal, somewhat playfully, offers her the hand that had been resting along the back of the sofa. Instead of shaking it, however, she slips her hand into his and leaves it there.

Slowly, so as not to spook her, he covers it with his other hand. “Perhaps we should begin somewhere safe,” he suggests softly. “Tell me about your grandmother. I see a lot of her influence here in your home.”

Ardelia’s smile is warm and full after that. The rest of the bottle of wine is polished off as she recalls the time spent at her grandma’s farm tenant house in her childhood. They had sold garden vegetables and flowers, and Ardelia would get to save the dimes.

There is a lull in her narration as Hannibal uncorks the next bottle. “Does she still live there?” he prompts.

Ardelia nods.

Hannibal brings the cork to his nose and inhales deeply before passing it to her. They taste the wine before she goes on.

Ardelia seems to have a much more vibrant recollection of the distant past than of the recent past. Hannibal doesn’t blame her for romanticizing it – he might even envy her idyllic childhood. As they continue along her biographical timeline, she tells him less and less about each interval. Apparently unaware of how heavily she glosses over life in the Mapps’ project apartment, she reaches the part of the story where her grandmother had borrowed against the house, to help Ardelia over the last hump when she was working her way through college. There isn’t much in the way of a denouement.

“It sounds as though she is very independent, and rather keen for you to be the same.”

“Oh, yes,” Ardelia replies with a small laugh.

“I can see why you admire her so.”

“She is the most caring, no-nonsense person I know.”

“Firm but kind?”

“Exactly.”

Recognizing the end of tonight’s story time, Hannibal lifts his glass, and they toast her grandmother’s health.

 

After a silence in which they both finish their wine, Ardelia says, “There  _was_ a purpose to my calling you.” Her tone is quite serious, though the wine is keeping some part of her wrapped up in the warmth of selective memory.

“Yes – you have news.” Hannibal sets down his glass and covers her hand with his, once more, giving her his full attention.

She slips her hand out from under his, but it is not a retreat. She traces her fingers along the length of one of his scars, and he wonders if she is more of a tactile learner than she lets on. He thinks, again, of how pleasurable it would be to teach her to play.

“I thought you ought to know that Matthew Brown’s case is being revisited.”

“Revisited?”

“There is some question as to whether or not he really belongs in a psychiatric facility.”

“What would be the alternative?”

“Federal prison.”

“Ah. His keepers are not convinced he is insane?”

“I can’t give you any details, since I’m representing the FBI on this, but that’s the gist of it. I think you have the right to know that much.”

“Thank you, Ardelia.”

“I don’t know if Will has the right to know, though.” Suddenly looking very tired again, she says, “I was hoping you could help me with that.”

“You were hoping I would tell him?”

“I was hoping you’d tell me if  _I_ should.”

“Is there any reason to?”

“Not professionally.”

“I’d certainly applaud any effort you might make in a social capacity, but, perhaps this isn’t the best news with which to engage him.”

She nods, then, with a small, somewhat sheepish smile, says, “Maybe I  _was_ hoping you’d tell him. His knack for avoiding people is almost artistic.”

Hannibal sees this as an opportunity for him to deliver to her news of his own. Slightly adulterated news, of course. After considering momentarily how best to word it, he simply states, “Sarah has left him.” It is, perhaps, a tip of the hat to Abigail, wherever she is, and the way she tends to disclose information.

Ardelia appears duly startled. “What? That’s awful.”

Hannibal simply nods.

The phone rings in the kitchen. She goes to answer it, clearly not done processing, as she neglects to apologize for taking the call, and whispers to herself, “God damn shit, that’s awful…”

Instead of being offended, Hannibal feels a small thrill of pleasure run up his spine. It reminds him how infrequently he catches Special Agent Ardelia Mapp off-guard.

 

Ardelia is on the phone for a long time, and stays in the kitchen for the duration of the conversation, and for some time after. Hannibal waits a minute or so once the rich, low tumble of Gullah-Geechee flowing from the other room ceases, then goes to see what is wrong.

Ardelia is leaning against the far wall with the cordless phone held against her chest. She looks miles away. Five hundred and eighty-five miles away, to be precise. Faintly, she says, “It’s funny you should ask about my grandmother.”

Hannibal takes her arm and leads her back into the living room.

“Your grandmother is ill?”

She nods and, when she sits, passes a hand over her eyes the way Will passes it over his face. If Hannibal weren’t so close, she might have let loose another litany of swear words. “I have to go see her. We don’t usually celebrate holidays, but my mother’s gone to stay with her, so… I think it’s serious.”

“You don’t go home for Christmas?”

Ardelia shakes her head. “We don’t bother with traditional holidays anymore. When we see each other, that’s cause enough to celebrate.”

It’s such a lonely statement that, though there is no threat of tears, she seems, momentarily, almost fragile. Calculating how to best use this to his advantage, he feels, at the same time, some genuine desire to comfort her. He slides one hand beneath her curtain of dreadlocks, and strokes it down her back. “When will you go?”

“As soon as I can make arrangements.”

“I’ll take you to the airport,” he offers.

“Thank you, Hannibal.”

 

Hannibal drops in on Ardelia the night before she leaves, bringing dinner – already made – and a small bottle of port wine. She greets him at the door, all traces of fragility gone. When he steps into the front room, he sees she is packed, and apparently ready to walk out the door at any moment. Two suitcases are stacked at the foot of the stairs, with her running shoes set beside them, and a printed copy of her plane ticket tucked into her passport on top.

Ardelia follows his gaze. “I feel a little better now that everything is arranged.”

“I’m glad.” Hannibal sets down his load and shrugs out of his coat. “And, once again, impressed by your organizational prowess.”

“Agent Price is in charge,” she tells him, taking his coat and hanging it over the bannister, as usual. “He’s going to cc me on everything, though he was very stern with me.”

“Was he, now?”

They sit in the living room, adopting their usual attitudes – Ardelia with her feet tucked up next to her on the sofa, Hannibal with his arm stretched out along the back of it.

“Apparently, I’m not to respond unless there’s an emergency, and, even then, he’d rather I _just take a damn break from it all_.” She starts to smile as she quotes him.

Hannibal chuckles. “He seems to be very supportive of others taking time off. I hope he occasionally rewards _himself_ with a vacation?”

“Not in the time that I’ve known him. I’ll have to be stern with him when I get back.”

“Is there anything I can do to help while you’re away?”

“Agent Price  _did_ ask me to give you his personal number.”

Hannibal gives her a playful smirk. “Oh, really?”

She closes her eyes momentarily in mock exasperation, then opens them and waves a hand at the coffee table Hannibal had unburdened himself on. “What’s all this?”

“Dinner. I thought you might be too busy to cook this evening.”

Ardelia gives him her own playful smirk. “You were worried I wouldn’t eat?”

“I was worried you wouldn’t eat  _properly_. A weakness of mine, to be sure.”

“A weakness that is certainly appreciated tonight.”

She brings out plates and cutlery from the kitchen. He lays everything out and serves up the handmade linguini and Italian sausage.

“Would you like a glass of water? That looks like a dessert wine.”

“Keen eye, as always. Yes, please.” While she is in the other room, he retrieves a small, flat package from the lining of his coat, and stashes it against the side of the sofa.

“I brought you something,” he announces when she returns. “A Christmas present, if you like.”

“In addition to dinner?”

“Dinner is hardly a gift.”

“You say that…” Ardelia narrows her eyes at him before holding up her plate to inspect it. “But this is hand-made pasta, and don’t try to tell me otherwise.”

“I wouldn’t dare,” Hannibal replies around a wide smile. “Nevertheless, I brought you something else. Something decidedly less edible. Would you like it now, or later?”

“Well…” She puts her plate down, laughing, and holds out her hand. “ _Now_ , I should think.”

“Good.” Hannibal reaches behind him and finds the package without taking his eyes off her. He continues to watch as she carefully unties the ribbon and folds back layers of dark blue and bronze chiffon paper. He hadn’t waited to ask her permission, let alone for her to grant it: he began drawing Ardelia Mapp as the Bee Queen the night of their first dinner here. Now, he waits for her reaction.

It is perfect. As the last of the wrappings fall away, revealing the portrait in a dark wooden frame that he’d stained and gilded himself, Ardelia gasps and brings her hand to her mouth. Hannibal thinks he might draw her like this next – back straight, head bowed, a look of wonder on her face as she takes in her own likeness staring up at her. Her fingers migrate slowly down from her lips, coming to rest at the hollow of her throat. She presses her palm against her chest as though trying to still her own breath.

“This is absolutely beautiful.”

She does sound faint, and his desire to preserve her in this state of breathless appreciation intensifies. He would like to show her how she looks, like this, beholding herself as Hannibal sees her. Then he thinks about drawing the Ardelia beholding  _that_ Ardelia, and on and on, forever. A portrait inside a portrait inside a portrait. Capturing increasing depth, while at the same time becoming more and more removed from the original subject. He has no intention, however, of removing himself, only of going deeper.

“I thought you could give it to your grandmother. So that, even when you’re not there, she can look upon the goddess she helped raise, and draw strength from her.”

Ardelia is quiet and still. When she does, at last, stir, her movements are graceful, and not at all sudden, but they surprise him nonetheless. She sets the portrait carefully to one side, then slides over to him and puts her arms around his neck. “Thank you,” she whispers in his ear, and kisses him on the cheek before pulling away. She smiles, warm and full, and says, “Shall we eat?”

 

Ardelia is lost in thought for most of their meal, but doesn’t appear troubled, so Hannibal allows the companionable silence to stretch on through to dessert. He clears away the dinner things and returns with two small sherry glasses and two small dessert forks, and two small tarts on a single plate. She has come out of her reverie and helps by opening the port.

“We didn’t get to finish our conversation last time you were here,” Ardelia recalls, taking the fork he offers her and following him with her eyes as he retakes his seat. “We were talking about Will.”

Hannibal balances the tiny dessert plate on a cushion between them. “As we so often do,” he acknowledges, and gives her a contained smile that permits her to take the conversation wherever she would like it to go.

She is as direct as ever. “You said Sarah left him. Was that before, or after he left you?”

“After.”

“Am I wrong in thinking that doesn’t make much sense? Pushing you away seems like the last thing he should have done. Seems like maybe Sarah agreed.”

“It is often the principle of a thing that troubles Will.” Hannibal takes a bite of ganache filling, savouring it fully, while also pinching his brow and frowning slightly, so that it’s obvious there is something he wants to add. At length, he says, “Ardelia, I have to ask. While I appreciate it, I can’t help but wonder why you care so deeply about my relationship with Will.”

She takes a moment with her next bite, chewing slowly. “Maybe I haven’t told you much about Starling, but I see a lot of our relationship in yours. And I think you know that,” Ardelia posits, not unkindly.

Hannibal nods solemnly. “Will you tell me more, now?”

Ardelia takes another bite while deciding, and Hannibal imagines the dark chocolate melting on her tongue. “Yes,” she says, at last. “I don’t want to talk about what happened, but I can tell you about the way things were.”

 

It was never sexual. They both found sex with men easier and more physically rewarding, but they were partners, nonetheless, connected deeply in both an intellectual and emotional capacity. Professionally, their careers kept pace with and complemented each other, at least until Starling filed a sexual harassment claim against a certain Paul Krendler, and, suddenly, all opportunities for advancement were closed to her. Mapp supported them both through those ugly six months with all the hateful rumors flying about the Bureau.

Domestically, their lives were near perfect. When Starling wanted peace and order, she would come over to Mapp’s side of the duplex and sit in the front room, just looking at the things on the shelves and walls, and quieting her mind. Starling was a world-class ironer, so her side of the duplex is where the ironing board lived, usually stacked at one end with collared button-ups that were worn too often to ever be properly put away. The space was clean, but disorderly and cramped. There were times, however, that Mapp felt comforted by the mess. Sometimes, they cuddled up under a blanket on her faded and threadbare loveseat to watch the evening news. Most nights, they convened in the kitchen, if not to cook or eat together, then to debrief, catch up, or exchange highlights from their day.

Ardelia seems distinctly self-conscious as she tells Hannibal all this, not getting lost in memory as she had when she described life with her grandmother. Still, some things she relays in such detail, it is as though she is looking right through the walls to what is on the other side of the kitchen.

“There was never anyone my life was more entwined with,” she concludes. She looks up at him, colouring slightly when she sees how intently he is focused on her. She looks back down at her lap and adjusts her ring. “But I’ve learned that what we had isn’t normal. It’s difficult to explain, so… I don’t.”

The statement is so reminiscent of the sort of thing Will would say that Hannibal feels the same instinct to prove he is above those who can’t understand anything outside the norm. “What you had was unique, and beautiful,” he says in a low voice. “It’s good that you don’t let others in who might spoil that, but it saddens me that you can’t speak to anyone about her.”

“I’m speaking to you.”

“We are much alike. Perhaps you feel you don’t  _have_ to explain.”

“Something like that.”

“I can see why you draw parallels between our relationships. I do feel, however, that you and Starling reached an equilibrium Will and I may never find.”

“Never?”

“For all I know, Will will continue to push me away, and I will give myself over to hopelessness, and stop chasing him.”

Ardelia frowns deeply at him. “Don’t say that.”

Hannibal gives her a warm smile and says, soothingly, “We’re not there yet.”

She laughs, a little shakily.

Hannibal stands and collects the empty dessert plate and forks. “I  _do_ worry that we will simply find ourselves old one day, embodying the stereotypes of a retired psychiatrist and a retired cop, respectively.” He says it lightly, though, if he’s honest with himself, it’s not untrue.

“What are those?” Ardelia asks as she pours the rest of the port into their glasses. “A hedonist abroad, and a drunk living in Florida?”

Hannibal chortles and replies from the kitchen, “The _Florida_ part being optional.”

When he rejoins her, and takes up his glass, Ardelia says, suddenly, “Correct me if I’m wrong, but he’s always had a bit of a problem, hasn’t he?”

Hannibal raises his eyebrows.

“A drinking problem, I mean,” she clarifies.

He tilts his head thoughtfully. “I believe he’s continually teetered on the edge. It’s a rather insidious disease, alcoholism. I fear I may not have done my part in keeping it in remission.”

Ardelia shakes her head, seemingly to clear it more than in response. She lets out a small, sheepish chuckle. “As you can see, suspending Will has done nothing in the way of alleviating my worries about him.”

“He is not for you to worry about, Ardelia,” Hannibal says, disguising the lick of jealousy he feels as a friendly remonstration.

“I know. I’d worry _more_ if he didn’t have you. I know you’ll look out for him, even if he won’t let you. I think I know you both well enough to know that, at least.”

“Being Will’s friend can be frustrating.”

It is her turn to raise her eyebrows, perhaps unprepared for such an admission.

“I often felt that for every step we took forward, two steps back were inevitable.”

Ardelia shifts to face him more fully, pulling her feet back onto the sofa and resting her elbow on the back of the seat. With one hand, she swirls the remaining port in her glass. There is very little left, and Hannibal notes that her cheeks have taken on a flush that has nothing to do with compliments or discomfort. “How so?” she asks, resting a cheek against her other hand.

“Will is pathologically self-destructive,” he answers simply, and finishes his own wine.

“I thought it was the work…”

“I thought so as well. Or rather, I hoped so, for a long time.” Hannibal sighs and stretches his legs out, crossing one ankle over the other, and casually allowing a period of ruminating silence. At length, he offers, “It’s his birthday next week.”

“I know.” Ardelia makes a small noise that is between a hum and a laugh. “Starling’s, too. If I’m honest, I’ve been drawing comparisons since I approved his temporary ID.” She polishes off the rest of her port and sets her glass down on the coffee table. “Are you going to go see him?”

“I go back and forth, daily, as to whether or not he would appreciate it. I feel I have been wrong about Will on more counts than I have been right about him.”

“You love him.”

“Yes.”

“Is that why?”

“Why I couldn’t see clearly? I’m sure it didn’t help.”

Ardelia gazes at him seriously. Perhaps her self-consciousness had disappeared with the rest of the wine, because she doesn’t seem conflicted about sharing her thoughts. “I have a theory.”

“Go on.”

“When you understand someone completely, there is nowhere to go but the inevitable path of dehumanizing them. There’s nothing to foster when the reason there’s no trust is because no trust is required.”

“ _What is terrible when you seek the truth…_ ”

“Exactly.” Her gaze falls to her lap again and she adds, softly, “It’s better that you love him and never fully understand him.”

“I’m inclined to agree.” When Ardelia remains quiet, Hannibal prompts, “You sound as though you are trying to convince yourself of a similar truth.”

“I am. Every day.” She lifts her eyes back up to his, and gives him the half-smile he feels he might finally begin to understand. Hannibal wants to commend her tenacity, but doesn’t think she would have it. He returns her smile, instead.

He expels his next words slowly, smoothly, the way he might slide a comforting hand along her arm, caressing first shoulder, then stroking down to her elbow and along her forearm. He offers them, weighted and sure, the way he might take her hand in his. “A place can be made in your world for Clarice.”

Ardelia doesn’t look away, though she gives a weak chuckle that sounds like a gateway to tears. “Here?” She touches her fingers to her chest.

Hannibal bends forward and kisses the very spot when her fingers vacate it. He feels her breath tremble beneath his lips. He kisses her neck, then, and her cheek. Finally, he presses his lips against hers, and feels them welcome him. It is not passionate, both of them being so adept at self-control, but it is mutual.

He savours the kiss, tucking her scent, and the feel of her skin, and the warmth of her mouth into the room of his memory palace he has just for her. He makes sure to catalogue her in this moment with each of his senses, in case it is the last kiss, as well as the first.

He can’t be sure when, exactly, they both agreed he should leave. Or  _why_ , exactly, for that matter. It doesn’t trouble him in the least.

 


	15. All the Way Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to the penultimate chapter!
> 
> Margot commits herself. Judy comes a little unhinged. Mason gets a fraction of what’s coming to him. Barney is Barney, and Will is Will. (Off-screen, Hannibal is probably rubbing one out thinking of Will, as though that makes up for his perving on Ardelia.)

Margot is stuck. Neck-deep in a pit of quicksand, soon to be pulled under entirely. The banks are so far away, she can barely see Judy, even when Judy kisses her and lies nose-to-nose with her. She can barely hear the words Judy snarls at Barney before slapping him, or her side of a desperate phone call to Will some time later.  _Some time_. How much? She tries to turn her head to look at the clock, but she can’t seem to overcome the resistance, and she’s not sure she wants to know how much time has passed, anyway.

Her inner landscape is dark. It’s night in the real world, too. Something comes to her – a sound, somehow penetrating the liquefied sand clogging her ears. The sound is familiar, but not enough to be instantly recognizable when so muffled. She pulls up against the weight arresting her movements, and manages to yank an arm out of the mire. She uses it to free the other, and, with unexpected energy, tries to wade forward. She strains against the saturated soil, her hands reaching ahead to claw at some exposed roots extended towards her from solid ground. She manages to get hold of one and pull herself towards reality.

The sound is Judy crying.  _Really_  crying. It’s a sound Margot has only heard once before. Her hands, slippery with mud, start to lose their grip on the roots. Despite her scrabbling at them, trying to regain some purchase, the vortex at the centre of the pit is too great a force to fight, and she is sucked back into it, even farther from the bank than she was before. Here, it is more liquid, like the muddiest mud puddle, and, though there is no clay to struggle free from, there is nothing buoying her up, either. So she sinks under again. Deeper, this time. To that level below the surface where living is only possible for so long.

The sky lightens in both worlds. Margot feels the liquid sand begin to warm above her. Suspended in it, the weight just shy of crushing her, Margot is thinking about marriage again. A few days ago, she was sure it was simply a promise not to leave. But she _is_ leaving, one way or another. She can either get help, real help, or she’ll be in the ground before the week is out. Now, it’s not a matter of leaving or not leaving. It is a promise to come back. A sound reaches her again – Judy sniffling in her sleep, her breath still shaky – and Margot begins fighting tooth and nail to free herself.

It is an agonizing and seemingly impossible escape. Opening her eyes and turning her face to look at Judy takes all the energy she has, and it is a long while before she can do anything more than lie there. She coaches herself through her next actions. Imagines doing them, before she tries. She pictures herself succeeding at each step, and that, in itself, exhausts her. Eventually, she tries to wiggle down to where Judy’s robe is hanging off the bedpost, but is too weak. Instead, she slides right out of bed, already faint with the effort, and crawls over to it. She retrieves the thin black pager from Judy’s pocket. It feels particularly smooth in her dry palm. She calls for Barney, then curls up on the floor to wait.

When Barney arrives, Margot hasn’t yet regained enough energy to lift her head from the floor. Her voice is raspy from disuse, and her tongue is dry and heavy in her mouth when she whispers, “Will you help me now?”

 

Riverstone Haven is a private recovery centre for women – the best in the country, Barney tells them, choosing his words carefully, with its own primary care facility, dispensary, and psychiatric staff available around the clock.

“Are you sure about this, baby?” Judy asks softly. She is folding the small amount of casual wear Margot owns into a suitcase, along with her workout clothes, a book of kakuro puzzles, and a few novels that had been on Margot’s reading list for years.

Margot sits at the window, trying to get through the bowl of hot oatmeal Barney brought her, alternating between gazing at the snow beginning to fall outside, and watching Judy carefully pack her things. “Pretty sure,” she whispers. It’s a lie. Judy looks so sad that Margot thinks this can’t _possibly_ be the answer. She amends the statement by adding, “I don’t know what else to do.”

“They’ll know what to do there. They’re… good.” Barney downplays what might have been an enthusiastic review, had he been giving it to anyone else. His good word would mean nothing to Margot, and Judy might actively distrust a wholehearted endorsement.

“How good?”

“Doctors get flown out to give lectures all over the world, that’s how good.”

He sneaks a look at Judy. She’s still obviously upset, but some of the worry lines crinkling her forehead disappear.

 

Will meets them in the nearest town and they have a quiet, subdued lunch at a lodge on the outskirts of it. They have the place to themselves. Margot, Judy, Barney, and Will sit on quaint, mismatched furniture in front of a fireplace that is almost half the height of the wall. The fire crackles into the silence, and the room is filled with an odd, sentimental feeling, like they’ve been snowed in. They eat. Margot mostly pushes food around her plate, taking maybe three bites at most. Though none of them are very hungry, they are collectively loath to move, so they order desserts that no one eats, then coffees, and no one requests the bill.

“How long are you going to stay there?” Will asks, at last.

Faintly, Margot replies, “How long does it take to get better?”

Will gives her a wry smile. “I wouldn’t know about that.”

 

Judy is quiet in the car. They all are, but Judy is particularly so.

Margot nudges her shoulder with her forehead, like a kitten. “Are you mad, Jude?”

“Of course not.”

“Why are you so quiet?”

“I’m just going to miss you, that’s all.”

“Promise you’ll come?”

“The second you’re allowed visitors. And you won’t be able to get rid of me.”

Margot settles her head back down against Judy’s chest. “Some honeymoon, huh?”

Judy finds her hand and gives it a squeeze, and, before she drifts off, Margot somehow finds the energy to squeeze back. When Judy looks up, she finds Will staring at them in the rear-view mirror.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Will replies, looking away. “I was just… wishing things hadn’t gone so wrong.”

“Wishing and hoping?”

“We could just find her another psychiatrist,” Will murmurs, half to himself.

“Private psychiatrists don’t have enough accountability.”

“No… Not my best idea.”

“You can’t just bring traumatic memories to the surface without giving a person the means to cope with them.”

“Talking about anyone in particular?”

“I don’t care what his  _plans_ were. He was fucking irresponsible.”

“I know.”

“I blame him as much as Mason.”

“That’s… probably fair.”

“And I blame myself for forcing her to see him in the first place.”

“That’s  _not_  fair. At all.”

Judy doesn’t answer. She is gritting her teeth against an onslaught of emotion she really doesn’t want to display in front of Will. When she has successfully swallowed the lump in her throat, she asks, “What are  _you_  going to do?”

“Probably not therapy.”

“Not that kind of therapy, anyway.”

“I’ll find something to take my mind off it.” He says this like he hasn’t already found the answer in bottles of Johnnie Walker and Minnesota 13.

 

Never having seen her wear flat shoes, Will finds it unbalancing seeing Margot so close to Judy’s height. Without heels, she is only an inch or two taller than her, and she is so pasty and thin, she actually seems _smaller_. A woman is talking to them, explaining things, but Will can only marvel at the fact that Margot had somehow become even paler since lunch time.

They are gathered in the lobby of the treatment centre, receiving instructions from a doctor who looks no more than forty, though her hair is mostly gray. Her voice is so soothing, he doesn’t even tune in to what is being said. She should be a hostage negotiator. He supposes, in a way, she is. The hostages just aren’t people, that’s all.

Judy’s voice is strained when she says, “Thank you, Dr. Hersh.” It’s as though it’s being stretched by the distance that is imminently going to come between her and Margot.

“Your wife can come help you settle in if you like,” the doctor says to Margot, then turns to Barney and Will. “I’ll ask you gentlemen to please wait here, though. We deal with all kinds of trauma here, and some of our residents rely on our women-only policy to feel secure.”

Margot takes a long time to say goodbye, and Dr. Hersh waits patiently while she does so. The Vergers are paying so much for her convalescence here; Margot could take all day if she wanted. Barney heard they’d been able to hire two new nurses with the deposit alone.

The goodbyes, themselves, are short, but Margot first has to gather the will to leave Judy’s arms. She goes to Barney. He doesn’t move, except to hunch his shoulders and stuff his hands into his pockets.

“Are you going to miss me, too?” she asks him.

He lowers his eyes, feeling, as usual, like Margot is testing him. “For what it’s worth,” he answers gruffly. He sees her make a small movement, like she’s going to extend her hand for them to shake, but, instead, she just says,  _okay_ , and moves on to Will.

“You know I am,” Will says, before she even opens her mouth.

The smile she gives him is a shadow of the one she’d given him the night this all started. When he told her a stag came through his window, and she blatantly didn’t believe him. She cocks her head to the side and asks, entirely without venom, “Don’t you have enough people to miss?”

He moves in to give her the briefest of hugs. “Mean,” he whispers lightly, and kisses her temple. Then, he says, seriously, “Take care of yourself,” and she lays her head on his shoulder for a fraction of a second, before throwing herself back into Judy’s arms.

Dr. Hersh smiles sympathetically. “We usually start allowing visitors after about two weeks, so it won’t be long, dear.” She doesn’t know that, when Margot and Judy are separated, time goes by half as quick, and every second is agony.

“Hey, wait,” Will says, as the three of them start down the hall. Margot turns back and gives him a look that would have been all arched eyebrows, had she the energy. Perhaps remembering how he spent much of _his_ hospital time, he warns her, “Don’t get too caught up, you know, trying to work out the root of all evil or anything.”

She shrugs, already fatigued. “Okay.” Then, looking almost puzzled at his warning, she adds, “But, it’s more evil. Obviously.”

“Huh.”

She waves her hand vaguely, like this is old news. “It’s turtles all the way down.”

Then Will and Barney watch her walk away on Judy’s arm, the doctor at her other elbow, guiding them. Margot has become so frail that they have to stop every few feet so she can rest.

 

Will starts getting anxious in under a minute. A well furnished psych ward is still a psych ward, and, the longer they sit here, the more he feels like they’ll discover him, and ship him off to their brother institute if there is one. Miriam’s voice comes to him as Margot disappears down the hall.  _It should be you._

Barney sits across from him, legs stretched out, leaning back with hands clasped behind his head. “So, you’re Abby’s dad, then. The one who had a stroke?”

Will clears his throat and doesn’t answer right away, though there’s no way it’s a trick question. “Yeah.”

“Looks like you’re doing alright.”

“You’re the first to say it.”

“‘Spose it’s all relative.”

“Ever play whack-a-mole?”

“When I was a kid, I guess.”

“My health problems are the moles.”

“Sucks, man.”

“Used to it. You and Abigail were friends?”

“Small staff. We worked together lots.”

Will wrestles with the question for a while before forcing himself to spit it out. “Did she say anything to you?” He hears his own voice as he says it. It sounds very much like an accusation.

“Nah.” Barney doesn’t expand. To a parent so obviously blindsided by their kid’s actions,  _She seemed unhappy,_  isn’t something you say.

 

Judy spends most of the evening wandering about a house that now holds nothing for her, pausing at each window like there might be something outside worth her attention. There isn’t. Will had gone home, possibly to drink himself to death. Mason and Cordell were still hiding out in the medical wing. Barney – well, she hadn’t paid attention to where Barney went off to once they’d returned from Riverstone.

Judy can’t help the flood of tears that accompanies the acceptance that this might be their life, now. She is so tired, so angry, and so lonely. She brushes away the tears, and her wedding ring feels cold against her cheek. When Barney finds her, she is deep in her revision of the afternoon’s events, wondering if she’d said enough before leaving Margot.

 _One day, I’m going to make you the happiest woman in the world_. It’s what she’d _wanted_ to say, at the last, when Dr. Hersh gave the two of them a moment alone to say goodbye. She hadn’t been able to, though. The words wouldn’t come out. She didn’t believe them enough to say them aloud.

 _I’m sorry, Jude,_  is what Margot had said, and,  _I’m going to try and get better._

All Judy could reply with was,  _I love you so much, Em._

Now, she’s sure that _hadn’t_ been enough. She should have told her not to be sorry, that none of this was her fault, that she’d love her for the rest of time, no matter what.

“Ms. Ingram.”

Barney had approached so quietly, she should have been startled. She isn’t. She might never be startled again.

Barney repeats, “Ms. Ingram–”

“Ms. Verger,” she snaps at him.

Barney responds slowly, warily. “I thought she wanted to take your name.”

“Circumstances change.” Judy’s voice has become thin and stringy from being constantly on the edge of tears, yelling, screaming. But there is an undercurrent of determination – the kind that says she’s made up her mind about something, and that she’s going to act with or without Barney. “We’re doing some rebranding.”

“How’s that?”

Judy looks at him sharply. “Now that you’re fired, you’re curious?”

It’s true that Barney had asked no questions when they summoned him to clean up the bloodbath in the barn. “I don’t know about curious. Worried.”

“She told me what Dr. Lecter said –  _Wait ‘til you can get away with it. Or get someone to do it for you._  I could be that someone.”

“No.”

“I don’t need your help, Barney.”

“Yes, you do. Unless you want to be served up on a platter right next to Dr. Lecter.”

“Is that what’s going to happen?”

“Did you really think Mason would find anything else more fitting?”

“I haven’t been thinking about what Mason wants… My mistake.” After a moment, she asks, “You’d really do that to Abigail?”

“Abby’s gone. She’s a smart girl. She should have known she was his only protection.”

Judy doesn’t respond. She is gazing out at the snow falling, arms folded as though she is cold just looking at it.

“Ms. Verger, with all due respect, he isn’t yours to kill.”

Suddenly, Judy smacks her hand against the window pane, rattling the glass. She does it once more before turning to him, maybe to keep herself from slapping him again, and finds herself shouting. “ _Don’t you think I know that?_ ”

Barney doesn’t answer.

Judy turns back to the window, seething. She glares at the blanketed grounds like they’ve betrayed her. Like it’s the snow’s fault. Again, Barney thinks she’s probably trying not to direct her fury at him. Maybe trying not to kill _him_ , if she can’t kill Mason. She doesn’t look at him again. “Why are you even still around? Get the fuck out of here, Barney.”

 

Judy is silhouetted in the doorway, bright morning sun streaming through the windows behind her – from the hallway where, not that long ago, she’d found Margot on her way out of Mason’s chamber, looking fierce, and alive, and stunning in a new black and white wrap dress. “Good morning Mason.”

“Judy! Come in, come in,” Mason invites, though she is already approaching.

“You and I need to have a talk.”

“Certainly. Come and sit on Santa’s lap.”

Judy sits as close to him as she can without vomiting. “Is this what the Verger name means to you now, Mason?”

“You’re insulted. Why?”

Judy says nothing.

“That pig was one of my finest achievements.” Mason’s voice is a barely tolerable whine, like he’d be pouting, if he had lips.

Judy continues to ignore his words. “I’ll take that,” she says, reaching over to pry the call button from his hand. The weak, atrophied appendage falls onto his lap. “Listen carefully, Mason.”

“I am riveted, my dear sister-in-law.”

“The  _only_  reasons you are still alive are, Margot inexplicably loves you, and I, unfortunately, need something from you.”

“Judy, Judy, Judy...” Mason tuts. “You can’t kill me. I’ll take it all with me.” He waves his right arm as much as he can, to indicate their entire empire.

“Oh, Mason. You don’t remember anything about that day, do you?” Gently, mockingly, she explains, “You don’t have nearly as much power as you think you have.”

Mason’s jaw muscles move, perhaps in a would-be sneer. “Did you dot all your  _i_ ’s and cross all your  _t_ ’s?”

“There  _are_  a lot of them, but I work best with some emotional drive. Anger, for example...” Judy leans closer and notes, with some detachment, that Mason is even _more_ repulsive when he’s scared. “And, Mason? I am very,  _very_  angry.”

To make her point, she brandishes the weapon she’d hidden in her coat pocket. With Barney’s warnings unfortunately foremost in her thoughts as she stood in the groundskeeper’s shed, she’d bypassed the array of shotguns, hammers, saws, and shovels – both spear and flat-headed – lethally honed along decapitation-friendly edges. She’d gone with a pair of dirty secateurs left out on the bench, probably for sharpening or oiling. They were dull and rusty, and perfect.

“Gardening?” Mason’s voice is slightly higher, slightly more loathsome. “I don’t think you’ll find much in bloom around here.”

“You made sure of it,” Judy agrees. She takes his right hand and places it in his lap next to the other. “I thought you were one for symmetry?”

Mason gnashes his teeth wordlessly, then snarls, “What?”

Judy shrugs. “Doesn’t matter. I am.” She pulls at his remaining little finger to separate it from the others, then slices it off with the shears, covering Mason’s mouth with her other hand as he starts to yell.

They both watch the severed digit curl in on itself in his lap. Suddenly, Judy starts laughing – loud, and a little bit insane. She chokes out between giggles, “Wiggle, wiggle, Mason,” eyes streaming. She picks the finger up and dangles it in front of him for a moment before standing and walking over to the eel tank. She makes a squealing noise as she pauses, poised to drop it, and, as it plops into the water and the eel snaps it up, she turns back to him and announces, “All the way home.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the lovely wormsin ([wormsin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormsin/pseuds/wormsin) on A03, and [@wormsin](https://wormsin.tumblr.com) on tumblr). They have been so helpful and supportive editing these next chapters and I cannot thank them enough. They are also insanely talented in both the visual art department (check out their tumblr!) and the writing department (check out their amazing and sexy Hannigram fic, ["A Mirror in the Dark"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10728969)!).
> 
> Continued thanks to my partner, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), the best murderwife in the universe, and the love of my life. <3
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)


	16. What a Cunning Boy You Are (Or - Don't Be Tacky, Will)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal shows up, and Will permits and actual conversation, once again sans linoleum knives. He doesn't make it easy, though. Dirty, desperate fight-fucking may ensue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like me, you probably wanted to throw the towel in and go fix boat motors in Louisiana at several points throughout this fic, but congratulations! You made it to the end of Part 3! <3 This is not the end of the series, the end of Murder Family, or the end of Hannigram by any means, as all of those things are going to go on forever.
> 
> My eternal gratitude to wormsin ([wormsin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormsin/pseuds/wormsin) on A03, and [@wormsin](https://wormsin.tumblr.com) on tumblr) for beta-ing. They not only tolerated my writing, but selflessly subjected themselves to reading it more than once to make suggestions and catch my mistakes. I'm pretty sure this merits sainthood. I could not have done this without them, and I cannot thank them enough. Check them out on tumblr, and please please please do yourselves the favour of reading their insanely sexy, kinky, angsty, and did I mention sexy Hannigram fic, ["A Mirror in the Dark"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10728969)!
> 
> Most of you are aware that my partner, Kate ([asprigofzest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asprigofzest/pseuds/asprigofzest) on A03, and [@weesprigofzest](http://weesprigofzest.tumblr.com) on tumblr), has been beta-ing this series since the beginning, but I just want to remind everyone that we have her to thank for its continued existence. She is the Hannibal to my Will, the Margot to my Judy, and the love of my life. Also the world's greatest murderwife and now, officially, my gay-ancee <3
> 
> Thank you thank you thank you to those of you still reading - you have magnificent staying power. I know this hasn't been an easy journey, and I can't promise it's going to get any easier, but I hope you'll continue to put your faith in me, and join us in Part 4. <3
> 
>  
> 
> [My tumblr](http://es-therru.tumblr.com)  
> [Our Etsy Store](https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/TheseAreHerDesigns)

Hannibal gives Will exactly two weeks. Had Will been more focused, he might have realized that time had passed, and expected him to show up. Or, at least, recognized the possibility that he might. As the embarrassingly large collection of bottles on the porch would indicate, however,  _focused_ Will is not.

When Hannibal does arrive, he is as unwelcome as muddy shoes tracked through the house. Will opens the door, sees Hannibal, and anticipates the dirty footprints that will be left all over the floor of his mind.

In hindsight, he will think of Hannibal’s presence in Wolf Trap less as muddy footprints and more as a great hand coming along, smudging ink on a page – not obscuring the meaning, just making it ugly. In his own world, or even in isolation, Hannibal is beautiful. It is his imprint _here_ that is abhorrent. Here, he transforms almost instantaneously into the beast from Will’s nightmares. The Wendigo turns, and his black, leathery hands skim the railing, smudging it. The Wendigo leads the way down the porch steps, and there is a smudge. The Wendigo walks with Will across the flats, leaving smudges in their wake.

He remembers how Hannibal saying, _Let us help you. Let me help you_ , made his skin crawl. Leaving Bev’s murder scene, he’d felt the straight jacket necessary. It’s unfair that these feelings are negated by Hannibal finding and saving his gift for Abigail – and saving Abigail as a gift for him. Unfair that, to Will, every gesture Hannibal makes, however calculated, is the most beautiful one. It’s unfair that Will needs him now.

“You resigned.”

“I did.”

“Some might view that as an indication that you are not, in fact,  _fine_.”

Will doesn’t look at Hannibal as they pace across the flats, ground crisp beneath the soles of their shoes. In the absence of dogs barking, it is too quiet, but Will has nothing to say. Eventually, when they come upon the treeline in bitter silence, he asks quietly, “What are you doing here, Hannibal?”

“We agreed I would never leave you again.”

Instinctively, synchronized, they both turn to look back at the house. It is still light out, so the effect of a warm speck of safety in a sea of dark unknowns is lost. Will says, “You could never accept the spirit of an agreement. You couldn’t wait to show me your bastardization of our compromise.”

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean.”

“You traded a life for a life, only in the most technical sense. Teach me to be vague in a negotiation...” Hannibal’s face is impassive, and Will can tell he won’t settle for less than Will spelling it out. He frowns around the acrid taste in his mouth. “I nearly killed myself over that case. You saved my life. And then you used it… like  _currency_. To buy yourself the right to do  _that_.” The bitterness on his tongue intensifies. “As though that could possibly be what I meant.”

“If I thought you couldn’t handle it–” Hannibal begins.

Will cuts him off sharply. “You knew. You  _knew_ I couldn’t…” His voice trails off into a whisper, and he sounds as angry with himself as with Hannibal when he says, “You always ask too much.”

“Say I did know. What now?”

Will shrugs weakly. “You win.”

“Really. What sort of victory have I achieved?”

Will just looks through him, eyes wet. “One you can celebrate alone.”

“An empty one, then.”

“What a shame.”

Hannibal inhales and exhales, looking out over the landscape in ostensibly serene contemplation. “What do I have to do to get you back?” he asks, at length.

“Think.” Will swallows, not sure if the bile rising in the back of his throat is anger, panic, or sadness. “Really  _think_ , about someone other than yourself. What they actually want, rather than what you want  _for_ them… Rather than what you want for yourself.”

Hannibal places a hand against Will’s cheek, registering with disappointment that Will is as stone cold and still as he used to be in response to Hannibal’s touch. He removes his hand and slips it into his pocket. “I take full responsibility for the way I am. All I ask is that you do the same.”

Will gives a dry laugh. “Is that all? How convenient.”

Hannibal is a well of calm. “Actually, my compassion for you is inconvenient. I let you see me…”

“I let you  _know_ me.”

Will’s retort is sharp and angry, and he morphs into the wounded animal Hannibal is so fond of toying with. However, the idea is less appealing in this very moment, so, from the myriad of phrases that come to mind, he selects that which best reflects this. “I care about you, Will.”

Will’s face is blank when he says, somewhat hoarsely, “You can’t  _possibly_ _…_ ”

Hannibal watches his eyes slip shut, and every line on Will’s pale face becomes starkly apparent – and hideous. Each knit in his brow represents a time he’d considered that the answer might be to snuff himself out of existence. Every crease about his mouth, a time he’d despaired of there being any other answer at all. Hannibal’s fist clenches in his pocket.

Eyes still shut, Will mumbles, “I know what you’re doing.”

Hannibal’s hand relaxes, and, with a small sigh, he closes his eyes, as well. “What do you see?”

“What do  _you_ see?”

They both open their eyes to stare at one another, challenging. Hannibal is quiet for a moment, then, “I had a horse I had when I was a child.”

Will raises an eyebrow. “Well, this should be interesting.”

“I called him Caesar. He was very familiar with both the carrot and the stick,” Hannibal continues conversationally. “He would get spooked if you approached with anything in the shape of a switch, but he’d only go a little ways, then turn around and watch you.”

“I love it when you reduce me to childhood anecdotes. What are you trying to say?”

“I’m trying to  _ask_. Are you still watching, Will?”

The question throws Will off balance, despite its apparent simplicity. The bile begins to rise again, and his minute smile disappears. He begins very slowly, after what feels like an age of silence. “What I’ve experienced, essentially, is the loss of a child on four separate occasions…” His jaw muscles work in an attempt to keep his voice steady. “I don’t want to watch anymore.”

Disappointment fills Hannibal once more as Will’s face closes off and his eyes stare past him, unseeing. “That was a long conversation, to end up where we started.”

Will lowers his gaze and admits, “I’m procrastinating.”

Hannibal studies with interest the slight quiver in Will’s lower lip. “What, exactly, are you putting off?”

His reply is almost inaudible. “Saying goodbye.”

 

The sun begins to set. They stare out over the flats, and the landscape glares back. Will closes his eyes again, brow furrowed against an impending headache.

After a while, he breaks the silence. “I’m curious, Hannibal.”

“About?”

“ _When_ you flipped that coin. Was it after I challenged you?”

Hannibal says nothing.

“I said you couldn’t change, so you showed me that you could... If I’d said that you  _had_ changed, would you have shown me that you hadn’t?”

Hannibal narrows his eyes. “I wonder if you even realize what a cunning boy you are. In some other world, I imagine this is how you trap me.”

“In some other world…”

“Yes.”

“I don’t dream of those anymore.”

“Other worlds?”

Will nods. “Just this one.”

Hannibal’s countenance softens and he tugs Will towards him. Will surprises himself by cooperating – by allowing himself to be wrapped up in Hannibal’s arms. Hannibal nuzzles his temple and murmurs in his ear, “It doesn’t have to be one or the other. You don’t need dreams of murder to keep your dreams of hell at bay.”

Will lifts his head, and their noses brush. “Abigail kept them at bay,” he says miserably, then whispers, “Why is she doing this?”

Hannibal wraps his arms tighter about Will’s waist. “She loves you too much.”

“I wasn’t  _actually_ asking. I know why – we drove her away.”

“You spoke of loss before, not abandonment.”

“Both are inaccurate.”

Hannibal is quiet for a moment, then asserts, “You needn’t worry about her.”

“I’m not worried about her. I  _miss_ her.”

“We can go after her. You know we can find her.”

“No.” Will shakes his head emphatically. “She’s better off without us.”

Hannibal brings both hands up to cup Will’s face. When he speaks, his tone makes it clear that he doesn’t understand, let alone agree. “How can you say that, Will?”

Hannibal’s hands are warm, and maddeningly gentle. Will thinks to kiss him just so they can stop talking about this, and he can put off thinking about it for another day. It’s worse than when he thought he’d killed her. Worse, because Abigail is out there somewhere, alive, but alone and with all her dreams murdered. She’s torn out his heart – but they’d broken hers first. “I can’t stand thinking about what we did to her. We were supposed to protect her.”

“We did,” Hannibal assures him, running a hand through Will’s hair tenderly.

“No. We ruined her life. Worse than Jack, even.”

“We can fix it.”

Will’s voice is thick, and he rests his head heavily on Hannibal’s shoulder. “We should let her be.”

“She doesn’t want that.”

“She doesn’t want this, either.”

“What Abigail doesn’t want is to see you unhappy. It would seem she cannot bear it.”

Will draws back, angry. “I can take responsibility for my part in this. Can you? You treated her like she doesn’t matter except as our daughter. Like she isn’t anyone unless she’s with us.”

Loath to say anything, as much of it would sound either insincere or overly-sentimental (and thus equally unbelievable), Hannibal keeps his response to, “That was never my intention. Abigail is special.”

“I know. Why couldn’t you tell her that?” Will’s gaze is piercing, and, when Hannibal is quiet too long, he barks, “Hannibal, look at me.”

Hannibal acquiesces, but remains mute.

Will lets out a frustrated sigh. “She loves you, too. She loved you  _first_. Why wasn’t that enough?”

Something darkens in Hannibal’s stare. It is a rare moment in which he is visibly conflicted over whether or not to speak.

Will feels the intensity of this struggle before he can ask the question again. He watches Hannibal’s hand rise to his chest, feels it slide up his sternum and come to rest against his neck in that reverent way.

Hannibal follows the movement of his own hand, and his eyes transfix on the place where their flesh touches. “She has such power over you…”

Will swallows, and finds that he is trembling.

“But you are mine.”

“Stop that,” Will says shakily. When he meets Hannibal’s gaze, he feels the trembling is justified.

Though there is nothing less than hellfire in Hannibal’s eyes, his voice is so gentle and adoring, it almost collapses Will physically. “ _Mine_ , Will.” Then, he kisses Will deeply, and another long moment passes, at the end of which they have both unknowingly changed.

Their foreheads are pressed together so tightly, Will imagines a spider web of fractures created where they are joined.

“Let me help you.”

“You can’t,” Will whispers painfully.

“I can. You know I can. It’s why you’ve been avoiding me.”

“I don’t know what else to do.”

“This doesn’t have to be so difficult for you.” Hannibal traces his fingers over Will’s scar. “After your stroke, you lost track of your becoming. You allowed yourself to forget.”

“I didn’t forget. Memory isn’t my problem. It all just seems… bizarre. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“What are you thinking now?”

“I’m…” Will lifts a hand to his face to rub his eyes, and sighs, suddenly exhausted. He senses a trap, but doesn’t know what it is or what it’s for. His mind is too tired to construct a lie. “I’m confused.”

Hannibal, too, is tiring – of this. His affection for Will is not bottomless, like his curiosity, and Will has stretched the reserves thin almost daily for the past year. He is about to express his annoyance when Will mumbles, “I’ve been conflicted about you since day one,” and, suddenly, the reservoir is full again, and he can’t help but kiss Will.

Will’s lips meet his for the second kiss, and pursue them for a third. Hannibal backs him against a nearby tree. Both their coats get left behind.

Will suddenly snaps out of it, and jerks his face away with a grunt of self-loathing. He looks down at Hannibal’s hand pressed against the front of his pants, cupping the shameful reminder that Will has precious little say in what his body does. He closes his eyes and bangs the back of his head against the tree trunk, willing the arousal to go away. Wishing for Hannibal to stop feeling so fucking good. Or, if he’s going to feel so fucking good, for himself to stop feeling so fucking bad about it. Apparently, his brain will permit neither.

There is so much turmoil in Will’s eyes, Hannibal wonders at the fact he is not frothing at the mouth. “There’s no sense feeling undignified about the processes the human body is subject to.”

Will refuses to meet his gaze. “You only tell yourself that in case you get caught, and indignity is all you have to look forward to.”

“I worry, when you say things like that, that you still intend for me to be caught.”

Will lifts his hands in resignation. “Worry about what you want, Hannibal.” He buries his teeth in his lower lip, still flushed with shame and hiding it poorly behind the snide comeback.

Hannibal grabs his wrist roughly. “What is this?” he demands, appraising the shiny burn on the palm of Will’s hand with barely-concealed fury.

Will closes his eyes so he doesn’t have to look into Hannibal’s. He tries to shrug nonchalantly, but it is weak. “It helps knowing what pain is real…”

Hannibal doesn’t let go of his wrist. He leans closer and says, voice dangerously quiet, “Aside from the obvious reasons not to do this, you have  _nerve damage_ , Will. How are you to properly gauge the amount of injury you’re causing yourself?” He takes Will’s chin in hand and squeezes his fingers against Will’s jaw until he opens his eyes and looks at him. “Is that all? An assessment? Or are you punishing yourself?”

“Not on purpose,” Will answers quietly.

“If you want to be punished, I can punish you.”

“Yeah, I remember,” Will says, bristling slightly despite recognizing the formidable ire in Hannibal’s glare.

“You are not in charge of meting out justice anymore. Do you understand?”

“I suppose  _you_ are.”

Hannibal drags a nail across the heel of Will’s palm and Will gasps. “You are too self-destructive to know when to stop. If you want to be hurt, _I_ can hurt you.” At the edge of the burn, Hannibal digs his fingernail sharply into Will’s palm at an angle, breaking the blister. He pulls the skin away from the raw flesh beneath, and the wound sweats droplets of clear, colourless serum.

Will swears and brings his hand to his mouth, sucking hard at it. “What the  _fuck_ , Hannibal?” he hisses.

Hannibal gives him a cold smile. “That should last you a little while.”

Will stares at him, conflicted once more. Here is Hannibal, overstepping his bounds, as always, and here is Will, deserving it.

“I can give you everything, remember? And I can take it all away. I can take…” Hannibal grabs his wrist again, pinning his hand against the tree. “…the pain…” He folds his own hand over the wound. “…away.” He presses hard against it, and, slowly but surely, the pain begins to ebb.

Something snaps in Will, and he suddenly collapses back against the tree. Squeezing his eyes shut, he begs, voice quavering dangerously, “Please make it go away…”

Then, Hannibal is slamming him against the bole and ravaging his neck. Rough bark digs into his back through the shirt he’s passingly unsure is his. Hannibal doesn’t waste time with buttons when baring Will’s shoulder. As the fabric tears, Will thinks,  _probably not Hannibal’s shirt, then._

He’s having a hard time concentrating. His thoughts are playing a messy game of capture the flag – like the kids would play in the big gravel field by the boat launch in Pascagoula when he was a boy. He’d been an observer then, and he’s an observer now, watching little side games of tag erupt while the few actually constructing strategies deliberated in clandestine huddles at opposite ends of the field.

He wants to focus on the dull, throbbing pain where Hannibal is leaving a line of suck bruises, but he can’t. Each flowering bruise is accompanied by a flash of something worse. The taste of the Carpenter’s blood – not from the speck left on Hannibal’s cheek, but from the rivulets running down the exposed muscle tissue of his own face. The sight of Margot sinking to the floor, baby in arms, ruined wedding dress parachuting down around her. Abigail’s voice when she says,  _you’re being a real dick, Will_ , sounding utterly betrayed. The ubiquitous panic – the hyperactive kid who doesn’t care which team he’s on – and the relentless question:  _Whose_   _skin are you in?_

Hannibal senses that Will is only partially present, and, with an irritated grunt, he unzips Will’s pants and grabs him.

Will grips his shoulder tightly. “I said  _please_. Make it stop.”

Hannibal bites him. Savagely. That does it. Will buries his face in Hannibal’s neck, clings to him, and rubs himself against his hand. Hannibal isn’t kind to him. The strokes are rough and dry, and he feels chafed in moments. Then his hand is on Will’s backside and at least two fingers of the other are inside him.

Will shouts in pain, tears springing to his eyes.

Hannibal keeps fingering him, despite Will’s instinctive struggles. “Is this what you want?”

“Are you going to fuck me?”

“Is _that_ what you want?”

“Yes,” Will moans. “No. I don’t know.”

Hannibal stops for a second and his eyes catch fire. “You never do,” he practically spits, and, with an angry hiss, he throws Will to the ground.

He contemplates him lying there for a moment, then smoothly gets to his knees and straddles Will, pinning him there with the heel of his hand pressing threateningly into the site of the old stab wound.

Cheek pressed into to cold dirt, Will hears the sound of Hannibal undoing his belt with relief and apprehension. Eyes shut, he observes what’s happening as though it is happening to someone else. Someone else having their pants and underwear roughly pulled halfway down their thighs. Someone else being mounted, having their ass cheeks spread and hole spat on. He braces his hand against the dirt.

Above him, Hannibal frees himself and sits back. He takes a meditative breath, setting aside the frustration and anger, and calmly strokes his own cock until it is stiff and leaking. Will is tense and still beneath him. He snakes his fingers into Will’s hair and tugs until Will looks over his shoulder at him.

Unexpectedly, and with no explanation, Will says, “I’m sorry.”

Something about the way he says it unsettles Hannibal. He shoves Will’s face back down into the ground and starts to press in. Will buries his face in his arm and groans. Hannibal goes slow, at first, having to pull out regularly to lubricate his cock. He wipes his hand on the back of Will’s shirt after every re-entry, and Will moans quietly as Hannibal pushes deeper.

It isn’t long before Hannibal is driving into him at a regular pace, breathing heavily through his open mouth, tongue dipping out every few breaths to wet his lips. Will pants under him. It is fortunate that he finds the scent and taste of Will’s sweat so appealing. He wonders if that isn’t part of the reason he so enjoys cornering him, and staging perils for him to thrash against in order to survive. His lips envelop a patch of Will’s neck and he laves his tongue along it before taking his mouth away.

Will is trembling. His shoulders tense and relax with each thrust. It makes it look as though he is sobbing silently, face hidden in the crook of his arm. He might be, for all Hannibal knows. He doesn’t think he can stand to give Will the opportunity to contribute, for fear that he won’t. He bears his hips down and rams into him viciously.

It becomes more and more difficult for Will to witness this outside of himself, with Hannibal grinding against him, filling him, kissing and biting him, and striking his insides with anatomical precision. A cry escapes him, and he struggles when the fingers digging into his hip draw blood. In the next moment, though, he can only lie there, shuddering. Every ragged breath he takes brings on a wave of pleasure from deep inside him.

Hannibal, smiling cruelly, watches Will begin to participate.

Will lifts his head so his arm is free and he can reach back to clutch Hannibal’s thigh for balance as he thrusts himself back against him. The words  _I love you_ are a battering ram against the backs of his clenched teeth. Any lapse in vigilance and they will burst through.

Hannibal fucks him harder. Will feels him begin to lose control, too. Feels breathy moans hot in his ear and under his jaw. Hannibal only touches Will moments before he, himself, comes, but it doesn’t matter to Will. He feels Hannibal spend himself inside him, and finishes seconds later, jerking slightly in Hannibal’s clutches until the seizing of his muscles gives way to shivering.

 

Hannibal stands, finally, allowing Will to roll over and do up his fly and belt with shaky hands. He sees that both sleeves of his shirt are wet with tears and saliva from biting into each of them in turn.

His back hurts. His ass hurts. The bites Hannibal sunk into his neck hurt. The raw skin of his left palm, caked with dirt, hurts. But he doesn’t know if it will ever be enough. Hannibal is standing over him, doing up his own belt and smoothing back his hair. “This is killing me,” Will chokes out. He crawls over to their discarded coats and picks them up, getting painfully to his feet. His is a long, black wool coat, thick and warm, and he has no idea where he got it. Probably from Hannibal. For a moment, he is troubled by this, before Hannibal is at his side, once more, reminding him there are more pressing things to be confused about.

“You’re killing yourself, Will.” Hannibal takes his coat and shrugs it on. He sounds aggravated, or bereaved, or both. “Did you  _ever_ have a clear moment when you wanted peace for yourself?”

Will looks off into the distance, a slight knit in his brow as he tries to recall. “Didn’t I?” He sees the three of them sitting by the hearth in Hannibal’s library, Hannibal gazing at him from the armchair opposite, Abigail with her arm looped around his ankle and her head resting on his knee. He’d wanted it then, hadn’t he?

He looks back to Hannibal, whose gaze is wholly focused on Will. “I thought we were going to be okay.” The words are sprung from the well of desperate sadness trapped between his lungs, and Will is furious with himself for letting them out. Angrily, he looks down at his hands and brushes dirt from the open wound on his left palm. “In a twisted, morally impaired way – but, okay.”

“What makes you think we won’t be?”

“You had to… you had to make it  _loathsome_ to love you.”

A beat goes by, then Hannibal says, “You still love me, then.”

“I don’t think love agrees with me.” It makes Will sick to say it. It hadn’t always been true. Love had been easy once, a lifetime ago. Now, though, it’s so rotten and ugly, he doesn’t care about what he knows to be true – that _he’d_ made it difficult, then. That it hadn’t always been Hannibal’s fault.

Hannibal places both hands on Will’s shoulders, bringing his focus back to the present mess they’re in. “This doesn’t have to be goodbye, Will.”

Will takes a deep breath, filling his lungs to keep out the loneliness already threatening to flood them. “You’re right. I never know.” He’s not exactly sure what he’s saying, only that it’s the truth. “It’s really one thing or another, but, to me, it’s always both.” He looks long and hard at Hannibal. They are standing at the edge of their family grave, and Abigail has just passed them the shovel. If they are going to bury her dreams – their dreams – she’ll make sure they feel the responsibility. Everything matters, now. Every time they fuck up, from now on, they will be adding a shovelful of dirt on top of their cold, dead future.

Hannibal looks back, and finds Will’s face closed to him. He steels himself for the words that might as well have already been spoken.

“I need things to be clear before I see you again.”

 

There is nothing more to be said. They walk back towards the house together, close enough that their knuckles brush with every step. When they reach Hannibal’s car, Will clutches his hand hard for just a moment. So hard, Hannibal can feel the pulse in Will’s thumb beat against his palm – imagines he can hear the heartbeat at his very core.

_Quiet, but fast. Like footsteps fleeing into darkness._

Once on the road, he flexes and fists his hand several times, working off the ghost of Will’s grip, and the way it makes him feel.

 

On Will’s birthday, two cases of Montrachet appear on his porch.  _Will Graham_ is written in elegant script on the mailing label. The message, unwritten, but just as clear:  _Don’t be tacky, Will_.

He doesn’t dream about Abigail leaving. Or Margot covered in the blood of their infant child. He dreams about Katrina, and the aftermath of the storm.  _Storms are evil then, if it’s that simple._ But it’s not that simple, and true ugliness is found in the faces of the crowd. In the blockades. In the squalid conditions of the city’s refuges. In the looting and theft by men sworn to uphold the law.

Katrina isn’t evil – men are evil. Katrina doesn’t care.

And Will, he will train himself not to care either. He has his dogs to take care of, and half-finished projects in the shed. Just after Christmas, he receives a job offer in the mail, and accepts. The next day, he bags all the empty bottles and takes them out to the shed, to return, someday, if he ever gets his driver’s license back. That night, he opens the first bottle of Montrachet. It lasts him three days, with some supplementary scotch in the evening, and he is absurdly pleased by this.

He doesn’t expect visitors, but, when the doorbell rings, he isn’t exactly surprised, either. Until he opens the door to the last person in the world he thought he’d find standing there.

“Molly?”

“Hi, Will.”

 

**END OF ACT I**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NEXT TIME: Part 4 is entitled Tom Petty and is entirely about Will. His past, his present, his relationships, his fears, his coping mechanisms, and so on. We learn some of the reasons he is so attached to Abigail; and why, since their reunion, he has talked to her so differently from how he talks to anyone else. We learn a little about why he wants the things he wants, and why he doesn't think he deserves them.


End file.
